


The Nahash

by Embleer_Frith0323



Category: The Dresden Files - Jim Butcher, Young Justice (Cartoon), Young Justice (Comics), Young Justice - All Media Types
Genre: Anal Sex, Complicated Relationships, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Dubious Consent, Explicit Sexual Content, Friends to Lovers, Gay Sex, Language, M/M, Magic, Magic-Users, Magical Artifacts, Male Slash, Oral Sex, Slash, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-05
Updated: 2017-03-19
Packaged: 2018-09-22 02:56:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 67,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9579407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Embleer_Frith0323/pseuds/Embleer_Frith0323
Summary: When a rash of suicides plagues Gotham, Wally agrees to assist Dick in an unofficial investigation into the matter when the epidemic claims a close friend. As they trace the final footsteps of the victim, trying to find answers, they unlock a chain of events that only leads to more questions--about the deceased, about themselves, and about their relationships, with both their partners and with each other. Further investigation brings them to Chicago and Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden, their best hope at learning the truth behind what has befallen them, and at unraveling the mystery of the tragedies continuing to fall on Gotham City.*YJ fans who have not read Dresden Files--fear not. I will explain anything that needs background via exposition and narrative so there will be no confusion. :-)*





	1. Act 1: Out of Eden

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all!
> 
> Hope all is well for everybody. ^_^
> 
> I FINALLY DID IT--I EMBARKED ON MY FIRST SLASH! :D
> 
> First off, many, many thanks to my beloved Mangaluva, without whom this fic wouldn't be what it is. <3 She has been a tremendous help and I am SO grateful. <3 
> 
> I confess, it has been new, and a little intimidating, but SO. MUCH. FUN. <3 I have a feeling that I'm going to enormously enjoy this project. :D I deeply, deeply love Dick/Wally, and I'm so happy that I at last caved in and decided to explore them in a romantic (and, dare I say it, a bit steamy :P) setting in fanfic. :-) I can't promise FAST updates (real life kind of hinders my free writing time, as I'm sure everyone understands!) but I will do my best. :D
> 
> Second off! As for any Dresden Files fans this story might have drawn in... This is predominantly a Young Justice fanfic, with the intention of exploring the Dick/Wally pairing. However, our beloved Harry, Thomas, Murph, Bob the Skull, and a handful of other Dresden Files staples will make their way into this story as guest stars and in cameos. <3 ^_^ When the premise for this story came to me, it occurred to me that it bore some resemblance to "Love Hurts" from Side Jobs, and I figured I'd go ahead and cross it over and let the characters combine forces against villains that might not otherwise show up in the YJ universe. :-) 
> 
> And third off--I'm hoping I resolved as many as I could, but there may be some minor formatting errors due to issues with my laptop forcing me to wipe my hard drive and switch to Google Docs, which behaves a little differently than Word. <3
> 
> I do hope that you enjoy my first slash! :-) Although... as I told a friend of mine, you'll probably be able to see the red beacon of my cheeks from outer space, I'll be blushing so furiously. ;D 
> 
> All right, time to shut up and leave you to it. <3 Happy reading! :D
> 
> Much, much love!! ^_^
> 
> Xoxoxoxoxo  
> ~EF <3

The dust whirled about my ankles, wheeling into a tan, cotton candy swirl that discolored the bottoms of my faded jeans. Dick knelt down, frowning, passing a hand over the five o’clock shadow that stippled his jawline. He looked exhausted--his eyes were circled, his brow creased, his skin anemic and drained. The mask of stress and grief. 

“I don’t get it,” Dick said, heaving a forceful sigh. His hand moved to rub at his eyes, pinch at the bridge of his nose. “I just don’t get it.” He looked up at me. “Wally, there’s no way in hell this guy would have committed suicide. None. It just doesn’t make any fucking _sense.”_

“It never makes any sense, though, Dick,” I reminded him, as gently as I could. “You know what they say, the clown--”

“The clown is always crying on the inside, I know, I’ve only heard it a hundred times at this point,” he muttered, uncharacteristically snappish. “Not so with him--I mean, yeah, he was an actual clown, but Wally, trust me, he was happy _._ Like, _really_ happy. I don’t think I ever saw him without a big, dumb grin on his face.”

I lifted one shoulder and scuffed at the dirt. “What exactly are you expecting to find here?” I asked him. 

“I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head. “Maybe some tangible evidence of foul play, some indication it was an accident. Anything to dispel the suicide notion.”

“Dick,” I murmured. “What if it _was_ suicide?”

He stood, and eyed me. “It wasn’t,” he stated. 

I felt my own brows crease, and I inclined my head. “...How can you really be sure?”

“Trust me,” he said. “You don’t lose every drop of blood in your body with no blood evidence to show for it cutting your wrists. Not to mention--Harry wasn’t the type.”

 _They never are,_ I thought, but I kept this, and the fact that said blood evidence was with all likelihood lost to the river, to myself. God knew he’d heard enough condescending, well-intentioned bullshit to that effect since some days before, when he’d learned that one of his best friends from Haly’s Circus--a one-man clown act notorious for singlehandedly dispelling the phobia of clowns for millions across the globe--was found dead by the shoreline of the river, supposedly by a DIY exsanguination job. He was the latest casualty in a rash of suicides that had plagued Gotham over the last several months. 

There wasn’t anything particularly out of place about the evening a few days prior to that--Dick was hanging out with Artemis and me at the student housing apartment that we still rented, even though she was out of school by then and moving onto her first job. My stint in the Speed Force set me back a ways, so I was still working toward graduating--meaning yay, we qualified for student housing! Barbara was working and unable to join in the fun, although she texted all three of us in times of slowness at the library. As for our mini-party, we were deeply embroiled in _MarioKart,_ Dick and Artemis threatening full-on warfare and bodily mutilation against one another, when Dick’s cell phone buzzed and beeped. He shouted a bunch of impressive curses when he drove his cart off of the course and lost his place to Artemis before she hit the pause key and whooped riotously. Laughing, he lifted his phone to check the screen. 

“Huh. Hang on a sec, guys, it’s Jack,” he said, and rose from the couch to take the call.

I smacked Artemis’ controller out of her hand, then hid Dick’s under the pillow--they both were creaming me to such an embarrassing extent I knew I could never sit in the same room as Garfield again without getting flayed alive. The one game that doesn’t care about Speed Force reflexes is, go figure, fucking _MarioKart._ Aka, the Friendship Killer or Graveyard of Relationships or where Love Goes to Die. (Take my advice--don’t play _MarioKart_ with someone you want to continue liking.) Artemis and I played a bit of keepaway with her controller--I _swear_ I didn’t use my speed to assist me… No really, Scout’s honor, and no, my fingers aren’t crossed behind my back--then both of us froze as though playing Freeze Tag when we heard a tremendous crash from the balcony outside. 

We looked askance at each other for the briefest second, and then Artemis rushed to the door, hastily throwing it open. I paused, bewildered, as I came up behind her. Dick had hurled one of the folding chairs down the steps, and was hunched down, his hands balled into fists, grinding into his forehead. 

“Dick?” Artemis hurried over, kneeling down by him. “Dick, what’s wrong?”

I joined them when he told us, his voice strangled and setting off a load of Heavy and Uncomfortable fireworks in my gut, that Harry the Clown, whom we all had met often when attending Dick’s performances with Haly’s and liked tremendously, had turned up dead by apparent suicide. We hugged him for a long, long, _long_ time, before he got it together and apologized for the fate he’d visited on our hapless folding chair. He offered to purchase a new one, but we gently declined. Then he left to go see Jack. A few days following the news, he called me early in the morning and asked if I’d meet him here, at the base of Westward Bridge, to comb for answers. Hurting _for_ him, and troubled not just by Harry’s death, but by the multiple suicides that had concentrated in Gotham myself, I agreed.

It really didn’t make enough sense to be satisfactory, I had to concede, following Dick as he walked up and down the shoreline, looking for clues that, thus far, didn’t exist. Finally, he sighed, and kicked at a rock. It skittered into the water with a _plunk._

“Goddammit,” he muttered, and passed a hand over his mussed hair.

“Look,” I said. “This isn’t getting us anywhere. Why don’t we try retracing Harry’s steps, see if we can turn something up?”

“I tried that, though,” Dick said. “Last night. Nothing really stuck out to me.”

“You’re upset,” I said. “I mean, obviously. Maybe you missed something, and dude, it’s completely understandable if you did.”

He was silent, but after a moment, nodded. 

“So… How about we go over his steps again?” I continued. “Together? I’ll help you out. Fresh eyes on it couldn’t hurt, man, you know?”

He rubbed at the back of his neck, gazing at the ground, and then nodded. 

“All right,” he said. “Let’s do it.”

*******

Turns out, the last thing Harry did was rehearse, work at the circus, and then hit up the attractions at the adjoining Amusement Mile afterward. He never gave any indication of suicidal ideation prior to vanishing and then turning up with his wrists cut by the river. Chatting it over with Jack, we learned that the last time he saw him was just as Harry left to go to the park.

“Let me know what you boys turn up,” Jack said. “I just can’t believe it. Something’s got to be going on here. Harry would never have offed himself. Ever. Not in this universe, anyway.”

“No, he wouldn’t,” Dick agreed wholeheartedly, and with that, we said goodbye to Jack.

The taxi ride to Amusement Mile was spent in a thick, slimy silence. Dick’s emotions roiled tangibly between us, like a mass of earthworms roving around in my own muddy uncertainty. I twisted my hands in the hem of my shirt, wanting to reach out to him however I could, but instead sat fast, completely unsure of how to go about it. It’s not like I was totally inexperienced in grief or anything--in fact, I speak Dealing-with-Death pretty fluently--but somehow, this whole thing just felt overwhelmingly different. Dick was uncharacteristically gloomy, his demeanor tenebrous and murky, as though a fat, dribbly cumulonimbus cloud loomed jealously over him, stuck to his shoulder by a stubborn balloon string. I glanced over at him, observing the creased, pallid brow, the careless mess of coal black hair, the working jaw, the sallow skin. I sighed. It was all just light-years away from his normal self. And even his normal _distressed_ self--I mean, I’d seen him pissed off, distraught, ready to fight, down in the dumps, five seconds from quitting life, you name it. I’d been with him damn near every moment he actively grieved his parents--like I _watched_ that old wound repeatedly torn open time and again with each anniversary or abrupt, painful reminder. But it’s not as though he overtly carried any of it around like an ugly, bulky backpack; he never dwelled on it, and he definitely never made me or anyone else feel as though we couldn’t approach him or extend our hands to him. Hell, if anything, he maintained _levity_ when upset--only growing jokier and more prone to a humorous exchange with every added stressor. In fact, while we’re on that subject, in extreme personal situations, the goofier he got, the more I worried. And yet, here he was now, discomfitingly taciturn, mute, and just so damn _moody_. I gritted my teeth and fidgeted, disquieted by how completely unrecognizable my normally buoyant and playful best pal was as he sat in brooding silence next to me. Why the hell was this occasion so different? This wasn’t the first time someone had kicked the bucket--far from it. I scratched at my hair, chewed on my lip, scuffed the floor of the cab with my shoe. Granted, grief’s a fickle, varying thing. Maybe, for Dick, this was just one death too many, or maybe it was the horrible fact that Harry was the first person he ever knew by all available evidence to take his own life. 

Arriving at Amusement Mile, Dick asked around about Harry, moving from the flashing, towering Ferris wheel to the kiddie rides to the largest steel coaster. I trailed along, feeling anything but helpful, and kind of like a fifth spare tire, half-flat and hanging out in the trunk of an entirely different car--unnecessary and just taking up space. 

I quit even attempting to contribute by the time we got to the concessions, and Dick subtly put the screws to probably every employee there like some twenty-something, wannabe Philip Marlowe in ripped jeans and the _Deadpool_ shirt he’d owned since the Stone Age. I couldn’t help thinking he was lucky that even in his dour mood he was still so charming--within a nanosecond I suffered secondhand irritation for every starving Amusement Mile patron that got stuck waiting in line, baking in the furnace of Gehenna (sorry, Gotham in July), as Dick commandeered the entirety of the afternoon asking every concession stand worker question after question after question--none of which any right-minded cashier would have the answers to. By the time the sun fingered golden through the latticed, looping steel of the coasters, casting long, dense shadows across the concrete ground, Dick abruptly found a bench by the back end of some garish, purple building, and sat down. 

“Shit,” he muttered, grinding his fingers into his forehead. I sat down by him. 

“Dude,” I told him, “maybe it’s time to take a break.”

He was silent, staring at the shadows near his feet.

“...Or maybe it’s time to accept that it was what it was,” Dick finally sighed. “Harry killed himself.”

I clasped his shoulder when he covered his face with one hand. I gave him a minute, just kind of letting him loose some tears into his palm, before I decided to have my say.

“Look, man,” I said, “it sucks. It really, really sucks. I really think the hardest deaths to accept are the ones the people chose. Like… that they sought, versus accepted, or that were forced on them. There’s no justice or closure in them, you know? And with suicide… Like there’s always a part of you that’s going to wonder if it’s your responsibility, or your fault.”

He nodded. “Yeah. Like I wonder if I’d paid more attention or just been _around_ more, maybe I’d have noticed clues that he was going downhill and then I could have helped him.”

I shook my head. “See, that’s the thing, though. I seriously doubt there’s anything you could have done. At the end of the day, he’s the only one responsible for what happened to him. And trust me--he didn’t reach out to anyone beforehand? He’d made up his mind. There wouldn’t have been any stopping him at that point, barring some extremely well-timed miracle.”

Dick sighed, and ran a hand over his unkempt hair. “If I’d just talked to him, kept in touch more…”

Again, I shook my head. “I really don’t think it would have made any difference, Dick.”

He crossed one arm over his torso, resting his hand on the opposite arm. “Maybe not. I just wish I could believe that.”

I nodded. “Yeah. I get that.” 

We sat in a long silence, Dick occasionally swiping at his welling eyes. I kept my hand on his shoulder. 

After a time, he drew in a breath, released it, and said, “Okay.”

I released my hold on him, and at last took note of where we sat. 

“Joker’s Funhouse,” I observed. “Does the Joker still run this thing?”

“Oh, no way, not in years. He hasn’t run that since Jason,” Dick replied. 

“That long?”

“Yeah, that long. Jason _and_ Bruce would both shit a brick anyway if the Joker still had any active control in Gotham.”

I laughed. “Yeah, no shit. You know I’ve never actually been in there?”

“What?” He looked over at me, finally, _finally_ , for-real smiling. 

“Yeah. Wall-man’s never been in Joker’s Funhouse. Not even to investigate a crime for the League.”

He shrugged. “Well, you know what, we’re here,” he said, and stood. “And frankly, I’m sick of feeling like crap at this point--why don’t we bust your Joker’s Funhouse cherry and go on it?”

“Go on it?”

“It’s a ride now,” he explained. “I haven’t checked it out since they converted it, though.”

I nodded. “Oh, okay. Yeah, man, let’s do it.” Hopefully, a little fun would draw him out of the stifling grip of grief, even if only a little.

The line for Joker’s Funhouse, renamed the Phantom Theater, wasn’t overly godawful, despite the twilight hours. It was a Thursday, always slower regardless of summer vacation traffic. In spite of the shorter wait, we got some decent chatting accomplished while in line, mercifully about things unrelated to Harry and death and dying and suicide, and Dick was somewhat his usual jovial self by the time we sat down in the moving car and drew the protective bar down.

It wasn’t so much a coaster as it was a motorized haunted house--the cars were singles, paneled on all sides, with open, jutting fronts that sported the protective bar. It moved at an unhurried pace through the sprawling interior of the building. Bruce and his vast assets had actually had a hand in cleaning up and reinstating Amusement Mile, under Dick’s strenuous urging, and frankly, the quality of the makeover that Joker’s Funhouse received proved it. There were plenty of creepy-ass, behemoth animatronics, effective jumpscares, and artfully crafted scenes. Both of us hit notes only dogs could hear, screaming like eunuchs when a massive, grease-black snake fell--apparently by accident--from one of the displays and into the car. I bounced around on the seat, frantically fumbling with the snake, finally chucking it into Dick’s lap. We wound up giggling like a pair of four-year-old girls when reality struck and we discovered that our unexpected serpentine companion was merely a convincing fake. Dick lifted it and shook it with a grin. 

“Dude, I’m keeping this,” he said. “Little keepsake memento of the time we totally screamed louder than we did playing _Outlast.”_

That snake. To think that giggling over that thing marked the last Accepted-Normal moment between Dick and me. 

To be honest, I can’t really say how, from there, one thing progressed to another. But somehow, seemingly by magic, we wound up crammed super-close to each other--close enough that, in other situations, I might have started feeling more than a little uncomfortable, given that this body positioning was generally pretty intimate and I only ever casually got this close to Artemis. It’s not like I was awkward around Dick or anything--I mean, the guy _was_ my best pal in the whole wide world--but it’s not like I ever cuddled with the guy while watching rom-coms and tittering about our crushes, either. And yet, there we were, sitting with our thighs jammed up against each other, arms flush together, his hand not even an inch from mine. And, for whatever reason, I didn’t feel especially compelled to leave room for Jesus.

“So why didn’t Barbara come?” I asked, trying to ignore the scent of his body spray as it infiltrated my nostrils. I don’t know what it was, exactly--some high-end stuff that he’d favored since the dawn of time. It was a distinctive scent--specifically herbal and spicy and citrusy--and I realized, sitting there in that unusually elective nearness, it was an aroma I had always associated with him, whether I was conscious of it or not, and had always liked and felt a comforting sense of familiarity from as such. “I mean… She’s usually your first gumshoe pick, isn’t she?” 

He shrugged, and looked out of the car at a panorama of horror alongside the track. “She is,” he replied vaguely. “She and Tim.”

“…So why aren’t they here?”

Dick brushed his hair away from his forehead, and looked at me, his features vivid in the variegating lighting. I felt an odd sensation in my chest--one I hadn’t experienced since probably my mid-teens, balmy and fluttery and tingly, and so long since last coming I didn’t recognize it right away. I broke his gaze for a moment, all at once inexplicably ill at ease, and cleared my throat.

“Neither of them really bought into the whole ‘foul play’ thing,” he explained. “And… I mean, I don’t know, I just didn’t want Tim doing his well-meaning professorial presentation and data analysis of ‘Why Harry Did, In Fact, Kill Himself,’ and I _definitely_ didn’t want Babs coming along.”

“Why not?”

“Well, because I’ve already sat through a couple thousand lectures on my objectivity, not only on this, but on... pretty much every crime we’ve investigated together ever. I just don’t feel like sitting through yet another one before having her come trailing along to indulge me until I get this crap out of my system--like I’m some pitiful five-year-old who needs like, a pat on the head.”

I nodded. I knew him well enough that I could read between the lines and get the likely correct impression that he and Babs had had something of a tiff about the same subject prior to him approaching me to join him in his sleuthing. “Gotcha,” I said.

“And then with Bruce, it would have been the same thing, just coming from a freaking refrigerator. And God knows he always keeps Alfred busy.” He rolled his eyes, and shook his head. “So… That left my best pal,” he said, and smiled. 

I smiled back. “How do you know I’m not indulging you like you’re some pitiful five-year-old?” I gestured. “Because you _know_ that’s what I think.”

His expression warmed. “Well, I don’t, but see--I don’t mind if _you_ indulge me.”

“Yeah, why’s that?”

He shrugged. “Feels more genuine.”

“Babs isn’t genuine?” 

“That’s not what I mean,” he said. “She’s perfectly genuine, just… maybe not in this.”

I nodded, and felt a little guilty. To be honest, I was being just as indulgent as Barbara would hypothetically have been, and I was sitting there silently questioning the hell out of his objectivity in this investigation, if there _was_ any, just like she would have. 

“So… how am I more genuine here?” I pressed.

“Well,” said Dick, rubbing at his stubble, “I know pretty damn well you’re not pretending that I’m objective here--” We both laughed, “but you’re also not sitting there expounding at me about how I can’t distance myself from these things, either. Or like… telling me I need to take a step back and let someone else investigate. Since, you know, I’m literally physically incapable of emotionally separating myself from victims of violent crime.” He shook his head. “I’ve gotten that from Babs _so_ many times now, like I just can’t sit there and listen to it one more second before I just lose my shit and go Mount Vesuvius at her. Like, last night--”

He broke off. Somehow, we’d gotten even closer. I could feel the warmth emanating from his hand, just barely failing to touch my fingers. It was a strain to breathe in a way that didn’t betray the acceleration of my eupnea, and even more so to keep my voice from shaking when I spoke. What the hell was the deal? I took a breath, clenched my teeth, exhaled. 

“What happened?” I prodded.

He grimaced. “Don’t tell her I told you about this, okay?” 

“Of course I won’t. Mum’s the word, man.”

“Thanks,” he said, and was quiet a moment more, visibly deliberating.

“…So?” I prompted. 

Dick sighed. “She _really_ let me have it on this one. Like… She brought up every single time she felt I was too emotionally invested in cases we were looking into--like she practically rattled them off on her fingers, Exhibit A, Exhibit B, Exhibit all the way through Z and on through the alphabet again." He rolled his eyes. "She brought my feelings regarding my family into the mix, she basically said I was incapable as a detective for these reasons, and--” He trailed off and sat in quiet for a moment. “Listen, I’m not trying to paint her in a bad light or anything,” he continued, his voice softening. “I mean, she _meant_ well, Wally, she really did." He sighed. "She was just trying to help.”

“Right, telling you what she thought you needed to hear.”

He nodded. “Yeah, exactly. And I know that. But I was so _pissed_ by that point that I couldn’t see it. So, I’m sitting there after all this, just kind of trying not to kill her, or myself, or other people… and then she starts coming onto me.”

“Oh, no way.”

“Way.” He sighed. “I feel bad now, but I just didn’t _feel_ like it, you know? At all. I know she was just trying to get my mind off Harry and the fact that she'd just royally pissed me off--I mean, nothing’s more distracting and demanding of spontaneous forgiveness than a well-timed blow job, right?--and she _knows_ me at this point, I mean, that usually does the trick. So her _intentions_ were good, just like they were with her Come-to-Jesus talk, but…” He looked over at me, and gestured helplessly with one hand, palm up. “Like I said, I just wasn’t up for it.” He paused. “Literally.”

“So full of puns.”

“You know me, man. Anyway, the truth is, I kind of just wanted a hug and a warm blankie and maybe a teddy bear. _Not_ having my character dissected and my goals and dreams crushed and having salt rubbed in just about every single wound.” He shook his head. “Even if I needed it. Probably the only time in my life I’ve ever turned down a blow job.”

I snorted, too. “Wait-- _you_ turned down getting your dick sucked?” I drew up a bit, and waved my hands in an appeasing gesture. “Err, I mean, cock. No offense.”

He grinned. “None taken. And hey, man--even _I’m_ not always game for getting sucked off. Kind of have to get it up first, and I think something like Harry and getting completely picked apart by your well-meaning girlfriend are bound to keep your dong at six o’clock. Doesn’t matter if your girl is a sexy redhead librarian in nothing but a pair of crotchless panties, totally DTF in front of you.”

“Dude, that’s like every man’s fantasy right there,” I laughed.

His grin widened, and again, he gave me the palm-up gesture. “What can I say, I completely choked.”

“Well, _she_ definitely didn’t.”

He burst out laughing. 

“I’m just kidding,” I said, my own laughter tapering as I sobered. “To be totally honest, I can’t say I’d be in the mood after all that shit, either, even if Artemis showed up in those same crotchless panties with a gag ball and ropes and tied me to the bedposts.”

“Now _that’s_ hot.”

“Hey, don’t talk about my girlfriend that way,” I gaffed.

“I wasn’t talking about Artemis.”

I was about to laugh and say, “Hubba-hubba,” but my voice stalled like a guttering flame in my throat when I looked over at him, and absorbed his expression. 

_Oh, God. Is he being serious…?_

His eyes, fevered and inscrutable, held mine, locking my gaze in place, all at once leaving me, for the moment, floundering and confused in the tossing deep end of a vast pool. I could feel my breath filling my chest, leaving it, pouring back in. And for as much as I felt like I should experience discomfort in holding his gaze for that long, I couldn’t wrest my eyes away, and frankly, didn’t especially want to. 

I know now, looking back, that I _knew_ what I was feeling, that I _recognized_ the barrage of emotions and impulses and physical responses, but at the time, I was hopelessly unsure of what I was actually undergoing, incapable of naming the little flickerings of thought and feeling and perception that sparkled through my awareness as I sat arrested in Dick’s deep, ultramarine stare. Possibly it was that they just seemed so… _outlandish,_ so far removed from my general state of being and understanding of myself that I felt they couldn’t possibly have been what I knew them to be. And yet--there they were, obliviously traipsing through my consciousness, sparking my body’s central heat into roaring full blast through my torso, shivering into my limbs and face. 

But how in the _hell_ was it possible? It’s not like I was a homophobe--trust me, not even close, in fact, I flat-out openly profaned of just the _idea_ of any kind of bigotry and often verbosely stood up for Jaime and Bart when some backasswards moron would make some ignorant comment--but I’d never entertained any same sex thoughts before, and had always identified as plain vanilla hetero. 

The closest I’d ever come to having thoughts wasn’t even all that close. I had drunkenly joked with Artemis once, when she’d asked me about it, that the only guy I’d ever have considered making out with on a dare would have been Dick. 

“Because he’s so damn hot?” she’d asked (once she’d finished laughing herself sick.)

“Well, yeah, there’s that,” I’d conceded, the alcohol loosening my tongue into complete and total honesty. “I mean, he’s got those girly eyes and really nice hair. It’d be like the next best thing to kissing a chick. Kaldur and Conner are good looking and all, but Conner’s like… _too_ manly, and that aside, Kaldur’s way too much like my big brother or my boss. But other than that… Dick’s my hetero lifemate. It just wouldn’t be as _weird_ with him, I guess. Like I think he’s the only one that I could kind of get past making out with and not have it get all awkward between us later.”

“I need to see that someday,” Artemis sighed wistfully. 

“Ain’t happening,” I soundly stomped her hopes. “This is all purely hypothetical drunk talk. I don’t know if I’d _ever_ actually be drunk enough for that.”

But somehow, I sat, eyeing him, Dick, my best friend, my _straight_ best friend/hetero lifemate, both of us decidedly _not_ drunk, _legit considering going for it_. Somehow I was even closer to him, close enough that I could feel the warmth of his breath as it feathered over my chin, intoxicated off the scent of his body spray, my nerves all live wires of energy, all at once conducting volts of hot, blistering _want._

I remained still, every molecule perilously close to doing the involuntary vibrating thing that sometimes hits me when I’m out-of-control excited or _really_ turned on or just generally spazzed out in some way, and tried frantically to define this abrupt, inexplicable onslaught of unaccountable need and--dare I say it-- _desire_. This curiosity, this yearning, this _something_ \--I fought to understand it, and then, with all my strength, to _resist_ it. 

Nothing doing. I went hard so fast a confetti burst of lights peppered my vision.

 _This can’t be right,_ I thought muzzily, my gaze fixed with laser-precise focus on his lips, my heart thundering like a stampede of elephants in my chest, aware all at once of his hand on my thigh (no clue how it got there), his palm molding to the shape of my quad, emitting insanity-inducing pressure and heat, _this can’t be right… I’ve never even considered or felt this, or anything even like it, and I didn’t think he ever had, either…_

“Dick,” I murmured, halfheartedly considering an effort at protest.

“Hmm.”

Instead of hitting the brakes before this could get any more awkward and foreign, I said, in the mellowest, throatiest, corniest voice ever, “You know… you’re my best pal.”

A rush of sparkling warmth welled up in my belly, trickling down into my midsection, feeding the erection I just prayed he didn’t notice (or did I pray he would? Dear God) when the pressure of his hand on my thigh increased--not by much, but enough that it was just perceptible. 

And then, before he could reply, before I could even give half a thought as to where this strange, sudden, seemingly out-of-character impulsion stemmed from, what caused it outside of loving Dick as my platonic BFF, what crafted it from my innards and breathed a sort of life into it as though it were a golem, I had visions of fireworks and explosions and the Big Bang and my ears popped and pealed when, so quickly I couldn’t even identify who had made the first move, we were kissing.

It was a tad clumsy initially--I’d never kissed a guy before, least of all a guy with a decent growth of stubble (later, I’d find road rash all over my face), and close enough to my own height that angling was unfamiliar--all bumping teeth and scraping facial hair and one almighty shock of overpowering wonderment at what the _hell_ was happening, but after a second of gracelessly testing the waters, we settled into a surprisingly natural, impassioned dance, one whose steps matched the other’s perfectly, and that mounted in tempo with every touch. I picked up on the astringent, muted hint of Listerine, the sweet afterthought of Diet Pepsi, the immediate sapor of lemonade Blistex. I twisted, feeling my chest lift toward him, when he reached out and laced his hands in my hair, his thumbs passing over my cheekbones, his tongue flicking against my lips. The vibrating started up with a vengeance and I lost a lungful of air when he then roved his tongue along the inside of my upper labrum--if I’d been standing, my knees would have fucking buckled. 

“Whoah,” he said, drawing back for one painful second, remarking on my shivering molecules, resting his hands on my shoulders, grinning. 

I grinned back, and kissed him again, shuddering as his tongue plunged past my lips, pressed lightly on my palate, then drew back, teasing me in a way that I’d not experienced hitherto and that drove me _nuts_. I sucked at his lower lip, simultaneously pressing my tongue to that hot, quivering sliver of flesh, then chased that with a bit of a love nip, a trick of sorts that had served me well in the past. That seemed to conclude Round One effectively enough, and we sat in that slowly ambling car, oblivious to the shrieks and bumps of the haunts around us, his hands on either side of my face, my hands clasping his wrists, his forehead pressed hard to mine.

After a second, he drew away, and fell back against the seat with a thump. I faced forward, shaking, molecules barely in check, hard-on still raging in my jeans. I wondered if he suffered the same issue. We’d _both_ have some serious blue balls later, if so.

“Wally,” Dick said suddenly. 

The end of the ride was approaching, just coming into sight. 

“Yeah,” I said, embarrassed when my voice came out a bit ragged. 

“Umm… We just kissed.”

I felt my lips, still damp, thin out a little as my heart got thrown into the next gear. 

“Yep,” I said, my awareness still lagging behind, trying to catch up to the events of the moments preceding. “We did.”

The ride ground to a noisy halt, the lock belching as it released the restraint bar. Wordlessly, we climbed out of the car, and made our silent way past the employees manning the ride. One scrutinized me with an expression that suggested he _knew_ what had just happened between Dick and me, his eyes--silver, piercing, almost inhuman-looking--boring into mine in the brief second that our gazes met. Disquieted, I kept my eyes averted from his preternaturally handsome face--would I have cared or even noticed how good-looking he was before the events of the ride?--and hurried out of the darkened interior of the funhouse into the sweltering heat of the early evening like Savitar or the devil himself were hot on my heels. I didn’t bother wondering if I was just being paranoid.

I fell into step beside Dick, my back wet with sweat that obnoxiously tickled my spine, my stomach effervescing and scalding as it tossed like a restless sleeper. It was still light out, and I blinked against the auburn gold of the canting sunshine. We walked a little ways, aimless, still not talking. I tried concentrating on quelling my stubborn boner and failed miserably. Damn thing made it hard to walk. 

We rounded the corner of a game booth, and wound up on a baking stretch of concrete that was somehow entirely devoid of people. I was still hard as hell, if anything, only growing harder every time I looked at Dick, the burning in my lower belly and groin becoming increasingly unbearable. Unable to shake the pressing memory of that impromptu, astonishingly steamy make-out session, I found to my acute disquiet that I wanted more--even as I riotously fought myself on it, I _really_ wanted more. I couldn’t tell if he was in the same boat, and honestly, didn’t dare ask. 

_Damn it,_ I thought desperately, _I need to leave, and now, before we do something we’ll regret later--_

I was about to voice that, when he slowed in his steps. I matched his pace, until we both stopped, and faced one another.

“…Should we talk about, uh…” he said, an unaccustomed shyness overtaking his normally open-faced demeanor, making him look undeniably, ridiculously _adorable._ The urge to just _grab_ him shot through me, threatening to start up the shakes again, making my voice stupidly quaver and break when I spoke. 

“Probably,” I said, thready and hoarse. 

He looked poised to speak, but was silent, his chest lifting and receding under his shirt, his eyes intense, potently blue, vividly penetrating mine. I only got harder, and harder, and harder, until, all at once, I couldn’t take it anymore. 

“Oh, fuck it,” I breathed, and launched myself at him. 

My blood screamed in my ears, liquid hot as it roiled through my veins at light speed, my skin breaking out in chills and gooseflesh despite the seventh-layer-of-hell heat that surrounded us when his hands drew up under my shirt, passing over the bare skin of my back, and yep, there went the vibrating when his lips moved to my jaw, my neck, my throat, the edge of my clavicle where it peeped over the collar of my shirt. I permitted my own hands to wander to the small of his back, teasing at the waistline of his jeans, meeting his lips again with a fervor when, in another oh-fuck-it moment, I let both palms cup his ass. I returned the gesture when I felt him smile against my mouth, his hands moving to my waist and resting there, fevered and sweaty on my skin.

“Wally... “ he murmured, his voice a tangible flicker on my lips.

“Yeah.”

“I… think I kind of want you right now.”

“…I think that feeling’s mutual,” I stated.

“Is it.”

I replied by drawing him closer, letting him take note of my erection as its outline pressed to his hip. “What do you think.”

I caught my breath when, in his own response, his hand slid from my waist, past the midriff of my jeans, _into_ the denim confines, and grasped my hardness through my briefs, seeming remarkably unintimidated by handling arbitrary male machinery. 

“I think so,” he said, a hint of amusement in his voice, something that, for whatever reason, _really_ amplified my already flaring excitement. 

“Let’s get the fuck out of here, then,” I said. 

“Getting the fuck out of here” turned into merely ducking someplace more private, considering that I don’t think either of us had a single hope of lasting the amount of time requisite to get somewhere outside of the park. We wound up in a utility closet out of the range of any security cameras that Dick lock-picked to gain access to (fumbling in his hurry), and then barricaded against any intruders with a length of spare shelving. The closet belonged to the building that housed the sports bar, arcade, and nightclub, and was stocked with janitorial supplies, a good portion of which were spectacularly upended to the floor as we cleared a space on a wide, single shelf that jutted from the far wall. I know there’s no way such a loud-ass commotion wasn’t heard, even with the noise from the adjoining arcade, but thankfully, no one came investigating--a good thing, since the very second that the door got blocked, it was _on._ Dick grasped my face in both hands, his lips opening over mine, his tongue in my mouth, probing and retreating, driving me even wilder than before. I tore at the clasp of his jeans, peeling them open, wrangling away the fetters of his boxers. I then kissed him to the full when I broke down all the walls of my previous experience and seized his erection, its length straining, rigid, and thick--when unconnected to my own body, something unfamiliar, novel, _fascinating_ \--under my palm. I swallowed the sound of his voice as he sighed into my inhalation, kissed him harder, stroking, pulling, relishing the feeling as he jerked in my grip and grew harder still. His teeth closed on my lower lip; in return, I tightened my hold on him, quickening my motions, touching him similarly to how I knew worked well for me. I was gratified when his lips parted and he pressed his face into my neck, his hands fisting the fabric of my shirt. He swept his fingers over my back and down to my middle, yanking at the fastening of my jeans. My own manhood sprang free, distending heavy and at this point painfully, hotly engorged. All of my nerve endings singing, I drew back a little, and gave him a full-bodied shove onto the shelf. Our torsos powerfully collided as I rushed headlong into him, lips following suit, and then I leaned my head back, the ceiling awash in the pale, sickly illumination from the single, hanging bulb, as that kiss moved down to my jaw, my neck. He tugged my shirt up, sliding his lips over my chest, scintillating at my nipple, drifting down the linea of my belly. My legs went all at once unsteady when I sensed the heat of his breathing on the bare stretch of flesh just over the russet growth of pubic hair that I regrettably hadn’t tended to in a while. His hands trailed down my back, across my hips, up over my abdomen, back down, then settled securely on my buttocks, and before I could make any sense of what was happening, he’d fused his lips to the head of my cock. 

I inhaled with a gasp, surprised at first, then exhaled slowly, letting my spine ladder itself straight at its own pace, until it bowed inward at the middle, extending my hips outward, sinking deeper into that humid embrace. Unabashedly, I moaned into the thrumming air, marveling momentarily at my distinct lack of fear, at how unexpectedly, utterly willing to open up and let go I was, in spite of how _foreign_ the concept of being with Dick might have been on the surface. But the fact remains--it truly takes some _real_ trust, _real_ surrender to fully accept a partner in this way, and yet, there I was--a hundred percent open, wholly accepting of him, alight with the consuming pleasure and sheer _joy_ of it. That it hadn’t always been smooth sailing between us only seemed to deepen that profound bond we’d immediately shared, given that we’d striven through those harder stretches together and emerged closer than before, and definitely far more connected than with any other friend or teammate. As terrible, cliche, and like a bad bromantic comedy as it might sound, I sometimes felt more attuned to him even than I did Artemis, following the rocky path that he and I had traveled and overcome during the Reach invasion, after my sojourn in and return from the Speed Force. I’ll never forget the feeling that overcame me as he took me aback by hauling up and hugging the breath out of me when we first saw each other again after that separation, that all-powerful sense of warmth that dispelled all pre-existing tensions, just blowing them _poof_ into a dust so fine it might never have even been. It was a feeling that came back to me full force when his arms wrapped around my waist, drawing me in deeper, consuming me completely. My hands tangled in his hair as I felt the warm, solid beat of his tongue, pulsing against the core of my hardness, sliding up, circling maddeningly at the crest, swooping back down. I was full-on keening in a voice so overwrought I didn’t even recognize it as mine, modulating even more when he pulled me unhesitating into the balmy velvet of his throat, moving one hand to include all of my manhood in his ministrations. 

_Fuck, fuck, fuck, I’m gonna come--_

Not ready for that yet, I planted both my hands on his shoulders, urging him away, every muscle trembling, molecules intermittently crackling into vibrating. He was half-seated on the shelving, and I took a moment to lean over him, lips pressed to his, breath exchanged in a heated fervor, before I gradually sank to my knees, shifting the fabric of his shirt and jeans out of the way of what I sought, trailing my mouth down the smooth, firm expanse of his torso, encircling his waist with my arms, mimicking his own motions. I brushed my lips over the reaching, inelastic length of his sex, ran my tongue along the upright mast, lingered at the tip, sampling that forbidden fruit--different, distinctly _male--_ and rose a little to look at him.

“You gonna turn this down?” I asked, goading him a bit. 

He huffed something of a breathless laugh, and before he could give me a verbal yes or no (thankfully, his cues weren’t too difficult to read), I added Blow Job to my dossier of sex. 

Giving head, to be honest, turned out to be a tad more labor intensive than licking kitten--but damn, it was _so_ satisfying when his hips lifted, his legs curled over my shoulders, and he rocked with my movements. Like, hello, _hot._ After a time, my jaw ached, and it threatened embarrassing failure in the first second I felt ready to engulf him all the way to the back of my throat, but, flying high on the knowledge that he’d done the same for me (and it had felt _amazing_ , by the way--it was, in fact, my first time being deep-throated, unbelievable as that might sound), I was so wholeheartedly into it that my pure, soaring enjoyment quelled any undignified responses, and I closed my gullet around him, naturalizing myself with his shape, the sensation of him, and parted my lips just enough at the base to allow my tongue to pay some proper attention to his coin purse. (That’s important, you know.) 

I glided upward, grazing the summit of his manhood, sinking back down, swirling my tongue around the unyielding core, rather having fun now as I experimented, all but ready to feel my body separate and fly to pieces as his back arched, his fists white-knuckled the edge of the shelving, and his thighs constricted tight at my neck. The sound of his voice, strangled and entirely involuntary, bellowed into the thick, sultry air of the stuffy closet, and I accelerated in my movements when he lurched and shuddered, grasping him tightly about his midsection, pulling him still closer. I heard him gasp, sibilate, heave--my entire body shivered, alight in the knowledge that there, in that moment, carried on our bond and our history, he was wholly, completely, unequivocally _mine._ And then, he was pulsing, leaping, wracked with paroxysms that swelled warm into my throat. 

His body, tight and shaking, gave out atop the shelving, and he diminished, abating, melting like soft candy atop my tongue. I tugged a bit, teasing him, finishing him off, archly taking my sweet time about it. He twitched, jerked; and then his form went liquid and heavy as he sighed in a way that--yet again--drove me _crazy,_ inspiring an act that would forever earn me the label of “Nice” in Manspeak. 

I rose over him, kissed his damp, fictile lips, tasting the sweat that beaded the cupid’s bow. I snaked my palm down my own abdomen, twisting under the hem of my shirt, then, candid and fully uncontrite, turned my attention to myself. All the while, our tongues met, his hands passed across the material of my tee, slid under the piping, and, not to put too literal a point on it, gave me a hand. Or two. His motions mirrored mine, his fingers tactile and nailing every hot spot, supplementing my touch, driving me to roll my hips into his grip, using my own hold to guide him. After a moment, I lowered my hands, and just let Dick take the wheel. He was, by some nature-defying miracle, doing a more satisfying job than I ever could, anyway. I was no stranger to touching myself, but hadn’t felt much of a need for dates with Rosie Palms in some time. I couldn’t even focus on kissing him as he drew the grasp of his free hand over the shaft of my erection, twisting his fingers in a riling sort of corkscrewing motion (where did he _get_ this stuff?), repeating that, all without slowing his cadence. He only had to perform that move three or four times before my finale threatened itself, and then, with a suddenness, he’d taken me into his mouth again, maddeningly fondling my holdalls--Holy. Mind-blowing. Orgasm. Batman. I exploded cum like I hadn’t since I was a teenager, my fingers tearing at handfuls of Dick’s hair, my voice competing with the sounds of the music from the arcade on the opposite side of the closet wall. 

Something like silence fell over us once the echoing peals of that immense peak rescinded, punctuated by the thrum of the speakers, the bass hummings of voices, and the musical, tinkling, electronic _dings_ of games. I pulled myself from him, mindfully _not_ looking in his direction as he soundlessly passed a hand over his chin, then brushed his sweaty, knotted hair out of his eyes. God, it was hot as _hell_ in that closet, I realized--it might as well have been housed in an active volcano. I rubbed the sticky, itching layer of perspiration off of the back of my neck, my hands quivering, my legs unsteady, my vision blotted and intermittent. Slowly, moving mostly on autopilot, my motions hindered by the full-bodied, rippling shakes that plagued my muscles, I pulled my jeans from where they were snagged at my mid-calves to my waist, and, fumbling, refastened them. I sagged heavily against a corner of shelving, unable to remain comfortably upright, my head swimming as though I’d just drunk a vat of whiskey and chased it with a bottle of Everclear. A wash of drowsiness overwhelmed me. Dick cleared his throat, resituated his own displaced clothing, and then leaned, unspeaking, on the shelf. I rested my forehead on the cold metal of the ledge, every atom of my body begging me to go to him, sit beside him, hold him, _anything_ but just stand there--but I felt locked, somehow, beneath a profound, crushing inertia, and worse yet, within the vice-like grip of an abrupt, devouring uncertainty. 

After a sweating eternity spent in throbbing silence and unease in the confines of that sauna-like closet, Dick spoke. 

“…We should probably head out,” he said, rubbing jerkily at the back of his neck, his eyes resolutely trained on the damp, concrete floor. 

I nodded, and straightened. “Yeah.”

I followed Dick as he rose, equally wavering on his feet, and unbarricaded the door. I trailed behind him, lips clammed up, subconsciously checking for onlookers as we exited the cramped, humid closet. As we ambled unevenly into the listing remains of the sunlight, falling into shadow as we passed by the taller buildings and booths, I caught sight of the rubber snake that hung from the back pocket of his jeans beneath the hem of his sodden, wrinkled shirt like a black cat’s tail--the emblem of the pivotal, cosmic rift that had just torn the world we knew asunder.


	2. Act 2: Wounded Earth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hullooooooo! <3 ^_^
> 
> I'll just drop this here--yes, Julian is meant to be Tom Felton's character from the CW Flash. I just love his character so much I had to give him a cameo. <3 
> 
> I hope that you enjoy this chapter. Again, all my thanks to Mangaluva. <3 So much to credit her with. <3 Much love, all. ^_^ <3 
> 
> Xoxoxoxoxo  
> ~EF <3

“So… Where are we going?”

Dick’s voice shook me out of my dogged, unspeaking introspection. We had reached the park’s exit, and had stalled in our steps just at the edge of the parking lot. 

“…Dunno. _Are_ we going somewhere?” I asked. 

He shrugged, squinting in the brilliant, burnt orange of the late evening sunshine. The silence dragged on long enough for a couple of stars to be born and then die in outer space as we awkwardly hovered on a sweating patch of concrete. God, I was _starving._ I hadn’t eaten since we’d nitcombed the concessions and was _really_ starting to feel it. 

_Hunger, seriously, just fuck the fuck off,_ I thought irritably. _Ain’t nobody got time for that._

“We should probably talk about…” I paused, and rubbed at the short hair at the nape of my neck. 

Dick’s lip wormed. “…Yeah, probably. And actually _talk_ about it this time.”

My heart skittered and I felt the blood rush to my cheeks. If I’m being honest, I _still_ wrestled with an incessant, clamoring, and frankly fucking _annoying_ urge to reach out to him, touch him, _connect_ with him. Engage in that post-coital bliss. It felt _wrong,_ standing there, not really speaking much and not touching, either, after the blistering intimacy that had gone down--oh, jeez, no pun intended--in the closet. 

“Not sure if we want to be doing that here, though,” I said, trying to sound unruffled, and failing. I abruptly realized what I said. “Oh, God-- _talking_ about it. _Talking_ about it, I mean.”

He chuckled a little. “It’s okay, I know what you meant.”

“Anyway, this place is a little too, uh, family friendly for it, and it’s not like we’ve got M’gann to help out with privacy.” I thought for a moment. “Restaurant’s probably too crowded.” I didn’t add that I _really_ didn’t feel like eating, for once in my life, badly as I might have needed to before I did a swan dive into the concrete.

“We could talk at my place,” he offered. “I mean, uh… I live alone.”

I fought a sickening, uncomfortable feeling. This was the first acknowledgement of the now monstrous elephants in the room-- _our girlfriends_. We had walked through the entire park in total silence, not speaking a single word, not even offhandedly, and definitely not daring to breathe the names of our balls and chains. Oh, Lord. Partners, I mean--okay, you know what? I quit. Anyway, we walked the breadth of that entire damn park without looking even once at each other, and all the while keeping a wide enough berth that you could have fit both of those enormously fat, proverbial elephants in the space between us. That what happened had, in fact, happened--I still couldn’t believe it. But there it was, that feeling in my groin, the sort of limp, liquid numbness entirely unique to the aftermath of an absolutely massive orgasm. My legs felt weak and leaden. I was still sleepy and desired a nice bout of dedicated snuggling. And not with my girlfriend-- _with Dick._ Which brings me to my next point. Thoughts of Artemis, even just a soft whispering of her name into my mind, powerfully wrung my stomach as though it were a wet garment, and for a second, I thought I might barf all over Dick’s Converse. I clenched my teeth, inhaled slowly through my nose, and swallowed. Dick looked equally poised to explode barf confetti all over the place in celebration of our current predicament, his face entirely drained, his lips thinning under the droplets of sweat that covered his skin. 

“Yeah, I guess,” I said finally. “Uh… You have alcohol? Because dude--we’re going to _need_ it.”

He brightened a bit, and laughed. “Yeah. We’re _really_ going to need it. Don’t worry, I’ve got beer. Although it might not hurt to pick up something stronger on the way there, since I know it’s going to take more than a grapefruit shandy to get _your_ ass drunk.”

I called for a cab to pick us up. We had the driver drop us off a short ways from the Zeta Tubes. We were talking a bit more easily by then, but still not overly gracefully, and not a whole lot, either--mostly just brief, superficial exchanges about such scintillating, deep subjects as the weather. Looking back on it, it really wasn’t too far off from a predominantly unsuccessful first date--stumbling and gawkish and lame. If people were to watch us, they might have thought that he and I were unfairly set up by well-meaning, clueless friends. _Oh, you’ll get along greeeaaat together._ Cue screamingly uncomfortable, repeated silences and bumbling through mind-numbing topics like Gordon Godfrey’s Tweet of the day. That I would _ever_ see a situation like this--where I couldn’t even _talk_ to my best pal--twisted my guts every bit as much as thoughts of Artemis did. We got along better when we were in a hissy fit back in 2016, for crying out loud. 

We stopped at a convenience store near his loft in Bludhaven, where we armed ourselves for what was sure to be one of the most discomfiting conversations either of us were ever to have--with each other, or with anyone else. And unfortunately, it _does_ take a metric fuckton of booze, all imbibed with aid from my speed, to get me properly drunk, and even if I succeed in transforming myself into an obnoxious sot, it doesn’t last long. With that in mind, we loaded up with jugs of vodka, six-packs of all manner of beer, bottles of wine, flavored rum, decanters of scotch and whiskey. Thankful that Dick was paying, I still didn’t consider food, something I’d need to rethink, since I’d probably pass out in the next hour without at least _something_ to nibble on, especially after blowing my load like I did.

Dick ended up taking the reins there, looking at me and frowning.

“Dude, you should probably eat something,” he said. “You look like you’re about to pass out.”

I caved. My head was spinning and I was getting uneasy on my feet. “Yeah, probably.”

I headed over to the mini deli in the back corner of the store and exhausted my cash to plow through a pile of sandwiches. Feeling a lot better for it, I took the opportunity to take a few breaths and re-anchor myself a bit before I met Dick back at the front of the building.

“Babs is going to think I’ve finally gone off the deep end and send me to AA when she sees all this,” Dick remarked, hefting the burgeoning bags of alcohol. 

“Or that you had a party and didn’t invite her,” I said. “Either way, you’re bound to get in trouble.”

“Not if we destroy the evidence by drinking it all,” he replied dryly.

I took a few of the bags. “Well, I can help with that.”

“In that case, I owe you a life debt. Apart from Barbara murdering me in my sleep, I’d look at all this and feel obligated to drink it myself with a bucket of chicken and a gallon of ice cream sitting on my butt watching TV. And then I'd wind up dying of diabetes.”

“Probably a less painful way to die than death by Barbara.”

“Probably. To that end, let’s avoid bringing Bruce into the equation.”

The air conditioning in Dick’s spacious apartment was like CPR after the close, muggy heat of the park and the city. I’m already pretty heat-sensitive with my insane speedster metabolism and I was really starting to feel like a regurgitated ballsack in the damp, smothering weather after the events in the closet and incumbent massive blood sugar drop. We unpacked the supply of liquid courage, chilling the beer, and leaving the rest of it easily accessible on the counter. Dick took the rubber snake from his back pocket to drop it next to a container of vodka before producing bottles of Leinenkugel from the fridge. We sat down at the kitchen table, Dick with one beer, and I with five, caddy-cornered from each other. 

We didn’t really talk much at first, instead opting to sip at the beer and stew in collective discomfort. As I sat, I realized that I had no idea what to say, or even where to begin--I mean, cripes, just _sitting_ there felt like the wrong thing to say. I tried to ignore the deeper, impulsive implications of the knowledge that we were in his apartment, alone together, and not likely to face interruption. Babs had called Dick not long before we walked through the door to tell him she’d been called for an away mission with a handful of other teammates that would last a couple of days, and asked if he’d be all right without her. I had to stuff the reflexive desire to turn cartwheels and rejoice when he’d said, “Go ahead, I’ll be fine, Wally’s with me.” For my part, I’d called Artemis to let her know I wasn’t sure when I’d be home, tapping into my inner con-artist by giving her a partial truth--that things were complicated, and we needed some time to hash things out.

“That’s fine,” she said. “Give him a hug for me, okay?”

My lips tightened. “Yep. Will do.”

I might as well just come out and say what you’ve probably already guessed--I wanted to do _way_ more than hug him.

I sat miserably, fighting with myself, and more so, _hating_ myself, actually, as I subtly observed him as he leaned back in his chair, his gaze on the surface of the table, his brows drawn over the bridge of his nose. Occasionally, he lifted the bottle to his lips, and, tracing its journey, I studied the curve of his chin, the angle of his jaw, the stippling of facial hair, the shadows his eyelashes cast over his orbitals. It dawned on me that if this were a movie, there would be a series of cheesy, slo-mo close-ups of all of these features as I sat and all but drooled over them. I drew in a breath, released a sigh, trying to calm my jump-started heart. _What the hell, man, since when were you a horny teenager again?_ I derided myself. _And last I checked--you’re not even_ gay, _or bi, or whatever, for fuck’s sake._

That didn’t change the fact that I had gone down on my best friend only barely an hour before, I thought, profoundly uncomfortable, shifting in my seat, trying to dissipate the sensation of twinkling that unfurled through my belly at the abrupt recollection. My best _guy_ friend. Who, like me, ostensibly was straight. I ground my fingers into my forehead, trying to shut the remembrance of the rousing sound of his voice crying out in his orgasm from my ears, the taste of him from my mouth, and worse, the terrible excitement that it all lit within me. I had no idea which way was up or down or sideways anymore, like I passed out on land and came to submerged in black, lightless water with no bearing on how to get to the surface. I ended up not bothering to resist staring at him, my breathing growing increasingly rapid and shallow. 

God. _Damn._ It. I wanted him again. I wanted him so bad I could _literally_ taste it, and could feel the squeezing sensation of pressure as I, again, went hard. 

I jumped when he suddenly cleared his throat and spoke. 

“‘I see,’ said the blind man to his deaf dog as he picked up his hammer and saw,” he said, then sipped his beer.

I burst out laughing, and dropped my head to the table as he laughed, too. 

“Then he spat in the wind and said, ‘It all comes back to me now.’” I shook my head. “This isn’t getting us anywhere, dude.”

“No shit. But fuck if I know where to begin.”

“Well,” I said. “Might as well begin at the beginning.”

“Which is…?”

“…Oh, God, man, don’t make me say it.”

He half-smiled, then sighed. 

“It doesn’t… feel quite real,” Dick said. “Does it.”

I shook my head. “Not really. I can’t believe it happened.”

He rubbed at his stubble, a habit that was becoming increasingly familiar. He’d been doing that a lot more than normal over the last few hours. “I can’t, either.”

His eyes met mine, and I had to swallow the hard lump of miserable, unfulfillable _want_ that calcified like solid poison in my throat. 

“I think the biggest thing is… what the _hell_ are we going to do about the girls,” I said unhappily. “I mean… We can beat around the bush all we want here, it doesn’t change the fact that we, um…”

I gestured a bit, unable to bring myself to say it, heartsick and nauseated over thoughts of Artemis. Dick sighed, and stared at the tabletop. 

“Cheated on them,” he supplied, equally unhappy.

I planted my forehead in both hands. “Yeah. With each other.” I looked at him. “Dick, I don’t get it. I really don’t get it. Where did it come from?”

“…I don’t know, Wally,” he muttered, shaking his head. “I don’t get it, either.”

“Can I ask you something kind of personal?” I paused. “Not that we aren’t past personal at this point, but you know what I mean.”

He snorted. “I doubt anything you ask me from here on is going to be anywhere close to personal. Shoot.”

“Have you… ever been with a guy?” I asked. “Or wanted to be?”

He shrugged. “No, not before today.” He ran his hand over his hair. “To be honest… I can’t really say if I was ever _opposed_ to experimenting with a guy, but the occasion never arose, and it’s not like I thought about it enough to actively pursue it. If I thought about it at all.”

I plowed through my fourth beer. “See, _I_ would never have taken the opportunity to experiment with a dude, even if the occasion did arise.” I floundered. “At least--I don’t _think_ I would have? Fuck. I don’t even know at this point.”

He looked at me helplessly. “I don’t know what to tell you, Wally.”

“God,” I sighed. “You know what’s worse--I’ve always heard girls say that the worst thing that can happen to a chick is to find out her boyfriend cheated on her with another guy.”

Dick’s brow flickered, and his jaw worked as he fiddled with the mouth of his beer bottle. “I think cheating in general is one of the worst things that can happen to anybody. Doesn’t really matter who it’s with.”

I destroyed my last bottle, zoomed to the fridge, found another, and sat with a thump. “Yeah, but it doesn’t help when your boyfriend--that you think is a _good_ person and would _never_ cheat and-and--” my voice pitched to an undignified high point, my arms waving madly, “ _and is fucking_ _straight!_ \--winds up sucking his best friend’s cock in a goddamn closet at Amusement Mile!”

He visibly winced. 

“Sorry,” I said, and pushed my face into my hand, immediately overwhelmed with regret at my outburst. “Look, I’m being a chode. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have--” I shook my head. “Just… I don’t know what to think.”

He exhaled. “Well, join the club.”

“Like you said,” I mumbled, snapping the cap off the bottle. “It doesn’t feel quite real.”

I felt his gaze on me, and I met it, weighted under a heavy melancholy, entangled in a net of confusion. 

“It didn’t feel _wrong_ , though, did it?” he asked, his voice so quiet I had to strain to hear him.

I was silent for a moment, thinking. The fact was, it _didn’t_ feel wrong. It only felt a hundred percent _right_. The only sense of guilt or wrongdoing had absolutely nothing to do with being with Dick, a guy, when supposedly that wasn’t the side my bread was normally buttered on. What it _did_ have to do with was how crushingly this newfound passion for Dick (please insert half-hearted pun for me here) would hurt my girlfriend, his girlfriend--women we adored, both of them, and who didn’t deserve to have their hearts broken like this. 

But, somehow, I felt, sitting there, that if it came down to it, I _might_ have given Artemis up. I really, really, really thought that I might have sacrificed a relationship that had gone on for upwards of a decade at that point, that meant the _world_ to me, that I _had_ wanted to continue forever, and that I’d have thrown Babs under the bus with her and taken the consequences if it meant that I could be with Dick. It would hurt--all of it, it would hurt, and badly--but I truly thought that I might do it. 

I’d started that morning as a decent person, a “good guy,” a morally upright gentleman that would never have hurt his girlfriend, deliberately or even accidentally. But there I sat then, any right to refer to myself as a nice guy all at once entirely forfeit, as I sat across from the person I’d just cheated on my girlfriend with. 

I clenched my teeth, and felt suddenly like crying--and I’ll be honest, I don’t cry much. It takes a _lot_ to get me to that point. 

“No,” I said. “No, it didn’t.”

He was silent, gazing at me, and I locked eyes with him, now no longer fighting it. 

“Can I be honest?” I asked. Not that there would have been any chance of deceiving him--my voice had taken on a soft, throaty, romantic quality. Conspicuously lovesick. Oh, dear God. I felt like such a moron. To think that Dick would _ever_ see me stupid-infatuated like that and making a total ass out of myself… 

He nodded, and I spoke quickly, before I could talk myself out of my confession.

“…I want you. Again,” I said. “And again, and again, and again. I want you _so bad._ I don’t get it, I don’t know where it’s coming from, but I do.” I released a lungful of air. “God, I do.” 

My heart shot into my neck and pounded visibly when he covered my hand with his. I stared at him, desperate to reach for him, desperate to resist, desperate to let it happen, desperate _not_ to just burn everyone around us at the altar and sacrifice my soul. But…

“What about Artemis,” he murmured. “And Babs.”

“Well,” I said, lacing my trembling hand in his, earnestly gazing at him, “the fact is… We don’t really get to call ourselves nice guys anymore. We’ve already cheated. We’ll probably lie about it. So… The Nice Guy train? Dude, it left, and we didn’t get on.”

“…Too busy getting off.”

I snorted. “Oh, God. I’d laugh, except…”

He gave me a smile, one that I had never gotten from him, that was so damn gentle, warm, and _charming_ I about went to a puddle of goo beneath it. That expression--although I’d never been on the receiving end of it, I _did_ recognize it. It was the one that only his partners, only his love interests could elicit from him. And it really made me feel like regardless of what we had done or would do, that this, all of it, that _he_ was worth it. 

(No wonder he gets along with his exes so well. That totally is his superpower.)

“Wally,” he murmured, his thumb passing over the back of my hand, the movement slow, subtle, fucking _divine._ “I don’t want to worry about it. I don’t want to think too much about it. I just want you.”

I let those profound, heavy words settle on the thick, loaded air between us, and then, finally, my decision made, all walls knocked to rubble, all thoughts of my oblivious, undeserving girlfriend zooming out the window in one big fast drive, I reached out, and ran my hand over his cheek, tracing his jaw with my fingers. 

“Then why are you still sitting there?” I asked, outlining the shell of his ear, my spirit gone from somewhere in the floor to maybe an inch from the stratosphere. It was all I could do _not_ to let my face break into a stupid-ass grin when we rose to meet one another, Dick’s arms lifting to encircle me about the midsection, his face pressing into my neck. 

“God, Wally,” he laughed suddenly. “What the fuck are we doing.”

“Right now, I don’t care,” I said, drawing back, grasping his face with both hands. I ran my fingers through his hair. “I know I probably should, but… frankly, fuck it. I’ll care later. Not right now.”

He smiled. I melted. Then, savoring every second, I kissed him. 

I don’t know how long we made out for. A minute, an hour, the whole weekend. I lost myself entirely, feeling the tensile warmth of his lips, the solid point of his tongue, the gentle grazing of his teeth, mapping the shape of his body with my hands, reveling in the feeling of his touch as he did the same. Had we really explored one another already, I wondered, helping myself to a double handful of his ass, pushing my tongue past his lips, tasting the Leinenkugel, taking in the warmth of his outbreath. Touching him now, it felt, if anything, even _newer._ Then again, we were in such a hurry to gargle each other’s marbles the last time that we hadn’t even bothered to properly go full birthday suit. I pressed my erection against his, mingling, occasionally giving him a bit of a grind, before I drew my hands under the hem of his shirt, and pulled it over his head. I’d seen him naked countless times before, in passing in the locker rooms at headquarters, but it wasn’t a sight that I stopped to admire or process or anything. Now, my motions slow and measured, I took the buckle of his jeans, opened them, let them drop. I studied his body, basically a brick shithouse, worlds different from the softer, rounder planes I was used to. Ugh, just _beautiful_ \--something I hadn’t taken notice of until that moment, as I ran my palms down the firm shoals of his chest, the variegated ridges of his scarred abdomen, appreciating every detail, every angle, every line. Some of those scars I could trace back to their sources. 

“Dude, if you looked any better…” I murmured into his ear, nipping at the lobe, cupping his hardness. 

He snorted. “Come off it, man.”

“Or on it.”

He grinned at me, and I met his lips again, before I let him return the favor of disrobing me, his fingers tremulous and warm on my skin, tracing down my chest, the outline of my abs, trickling over my hip bones, sliding down, then back up my thighs. That nudity, intimate and close, was just. Fucking. _Delicious._ God. I had to remember to breathe when his tongue pulsed in my mouth, and although I didn’t necessarily want things to roll faster, I couldn’t help myself--I ran my hand over the resistance of his arousal, relishing the little, reflexive movements in his hips as he reacted to my touch. By the time he drew away, I was so hard that it _hurt._ I saw from the corner of my eye that the sun had gone down outside, that the sky was colored with a diffuse purple over the lights of the Bludhaven skyline. I clutched him to me, not letting him back fully away, not about to release him. 

“I, um…” He gazed at me from that close proximity, his eyes a smoky blue-violet in the dim, periwinkle light from the window _,_ “I have lube here. And condoms.”

My eyeballs about popped cartoon-style out of my head, and I stared at him, taken completely aback for a moment. 

“Sorry, what?” I said stupidly. 

He lifted a shoulder. 

I exhaled, and wet my lips. “…Oh, man.” 

“So…” He inclined his head. “If you’re up for it…”

I stood for a second, absorbing what he’d said.

Then, I reacted entirely on instinct, and yanked him to me, kissing him with a bestial ferocity, breathing in the little “Whoah,” that burst from his lungs as his chest jounced against mine. An abrupt, screaming desperation wailed like a banshee and drowned out everything around me as I lividly squeezed my hands into the small of his back, the bones of his hips, the flesh of his buttocks, probably leaving bruises, not in much of a frame of mind to worry. If I could have, I’d have just thrown him with all my strength into the wall and taken him right then and there until I hit my own Hallelujah and the angels carted me off into the heavenly post-coital afterlife, but, agonizingly, I _knew_ that I couldn’t, not without running the major risk of bodily harm. I’d only gone in Artemis’ back door twice, and most notably, the first time was, uhh… Well, it was a learning experience. (I’m actually shocked there was a second time. Note--lube. It’s a Thing. Alcohol, if your partner staunchly refuses to relax, is also a Thing. Simple tip: Do not seek to unlock the mysteries of booty sex without both in ample supply.) I shook against him, undulating violently, hardly in control of myself, mad and all but rabid with unthinking, blinding _want_. 

“How do _you_ feel about it,” I breathed finally, grasping his sex, roving my hand over it, sinking my teeth into his lower lip. 

“If I didn’t want it,” he said, “I wouldn’t have said anything.”

I was in a deficit of clever things to say, since there wasn’t really any blood anywhere near my brain. Nevertheless, I gave it a shot. “Naughty minx…”

(F-minus.)

“Plus,” he said, breathless now, straining against my midsection, “if we’re not into this, we’ll know we’re definitely not gay.”

I calmed a little, and laughed. “Okay, fair enough.”

We made the torturous way up the stairs to the garret bedroom that overlooked the main living area of his apartment, my whole body humming with excitement, intermittently shivering my molecules into fluctuating. It occurred to me with a sense of glee that I had a good use for that entirely knee-jerk “trick”--and it would ensure we’d _both_ come, and _epically_. (Won't lie--it's pretty cool, being a human vibrator.)

I crawled atop the surface of Dick’s bed as he eased down on it, and leaned over him, resting my weight on my elbows, arms on either side of him, still just barely holding myself in check. We kissed for a few excruciating minutes, then tapered off for long enough so that he could produce the condoms and lube from his nightstand. I wasn’t sure how we’d work things this first time, and wondered if a little contest of wills was ahead of us. To tell the truth, I didn’t mind all that much if there was--and I kind of went from noon to one (if that’s possible) at the prospect of jockeying for position.

That wasn’t quite what happened, but I’ll just say this now--my first time with a guy (more specifically, with Dick) is probably something I’ll hold jealously to and revisit in times I feel like leaping off of a building, like a ginger dude version of Scarlet O’Hara cleaving like a psycho hose beast to the warming fire of Ashley’s supposed love.

Dick reclined into the pillows beside me, stretched, then relaxed.

“So,” he said, something like a teasing smile on his face as he waved the lube and condoms in the air. 

I snatched them from him, depositing them behind my back, and before he could protest, I covered his lips with mine, trailing my hand down his abdomen. He sighed, lifted his hips into my grasp, wove his fingers in a handful of my hair. A tad impatient, I moved my hand, nudged his hip, encouraging him to turn onto his side. Any sense of urgency aside, I was a little surprised when he didn’t fight me on any of it--I was expecting at least _some_ resistance or debate over this. I ran my hands over his back, and pulled him closer to me. 

“You know,” I remarked, “I’m a little shocked by how, like… completely cool you are with this whole thing. You _sure_ you’ve never been with a guy?”

He turned to look at me, his lip quirking. “Uh, yeah, about that. Barb and I… might or might not have pegged a time or two.” 

My jaw literally dropped. “ _Dude!”_

He laughed at my reaction. “Yep.”

“I am never going to be able to look at Babs the same way again… Cripes, or you.”

“Dude, knock it all you want, but if you’re in the right mindset and you _really_ trust your partner, it’s actually kind of hot.”

“Did you do it on International Women’s Day?” I gibbed, although I can’t lie--I got a generous dose of mush when I picked up on the fact that he might have been indicating that he had a pretty enormous amount of trust in me. 

“That, and Valentine’s Day,” Dick said, smirking. 

“…Nothing says romance quite like the Texas Twenty-Five creeping up your back door.”

Dick grinned at me. “Like I said, knock it all you want--I regret nothing. It boils down to trust.”

“So you trust _me_ , then?”

I said this humorously, teasing more than anything, but Dick’s expression, when he turned to face me, was anything but jokey. 

“Wally,” he said, “I trust you more than anyone else on this planet. Or any other.”

…Wow. We were at the point of dorky romantic talk. Or maybe he was just a little more drunk than I thought (not a bad thing, considering what we were poising to do.) I paused, and then issued something of a chuckle. 

“ _Don’t,”_ I said breathily, spoofing that stupid vampire flick, then smothered his would-be laugh, closing my lips over his. 

Given my already excited state, it didn’t take too long to escalate, maybe a minute or two of kissy-feely, before things things went from simmer to boil. I can actually identify what the detonator was--it was that moment when, as I was giving him a handy, he thrust his hips into it with a fervency that, for about the umpteenth time that day, drove me straight off the deep end. I couldn’t hold off anymore--like I needed him _right then._

I hauled up and flipped him to his front, taking only the time necessary to strap a condom on and dump sufficient lubricant on the requisite areas with shaking hands, and then, as slowly as I could without dying inside, I slid my palms over the smooth planes of his skin, fitting my form to his, my chest and abdomen molding to the shape of his back. 

So… It wasn’t all that far off from losing my virginity. Maybe a tad less clumsy. But definitely in the same ballpark. 

For one, I couldn’t just barge on in like I owned the place, I had to sort of guide my way there, not yet really knowing his body, and equally traversing unknown territory. If I’m going to get blunt as a spoon and level with total honesty, anal _feels_ different, and the glaring fact that Dick was a _guy_ just shoved that difference into a whole new dimension. The _newness_ of that aspect led to no small amount of self-consciousness and uncertainty, both things I’d shed ages ago when it came to sex. For another thing, you absolutely _have_ to have a relaxed partner if you’re going to attempt it, so if Dick tensed up even a little, I needed to pause, and give him a second to chill out. Lastly, when I made that one, final motion that _got_ me there, I absolutely had to stop and breathe--or I’d have blown it right then, another fairly common characteristic of V Card loss. It didn’t help when he lifted his head, pressing his face to mine, an unguarded hum escaping his throat. There was no going back at this point, I knew, inhaling, collecting myself. I was _way_ too deeply embroiled in this now. 

It pained me, but I kept it slow at first, reading his body language, responding to it. After a time, we both rose up, kneeling entwined, and I passed my hands over the breadth of his thighs, meeting at his middle, stroking his hardness in time with the rhythm I kept. I still couldn’t quite comprehend it, that I was _here,_ that this was truly happening, but more so, how much I was losing myself in it--how much I loved the feeling of being so _connected_ to him, how this felt so much like finally finishing a gajillion-piece puzzle, situating that last piece into its niche, experiencing that same sense of completion and satisfaction. 

His head sank back, his throat arched with his neck fitting to my shoulder, all of his muscles rippling. I loved the shape of his throat, its unexpectedly elegant curvature that was so dichotomously juxtaposed against the sharp, acute angle of his jawline, and I raised one hand to close it over that smooth arc, keeping that touch gentle, not applying any pressure--the idea wasn’t to go all BDSM on him—and then followed the bow of his Adam’s apple, sliding my hand down to encircle him at the ribs. My breath came faster and the vibrations started when his mouth opened and he issued the male version of these murderously sexy sort of low-pitched kitten noises--not sure how else to describe them, but that’s the closest I can come up with. 

I slowed (and in retrospect probably should have stopped, but honestly, it was like trying to halt a barreling freight train with a length of rope by that time, so slowing by itself was an accomplishment, forgive me a second of tooting my own horn to that end) when those sounds morphed into tones that discomfitingly resembled something far more like whimpering. I moved my hands to his waist, whispering in his ear, “You okay?”

He didn’t reply immediately, visibly holding his breath, his hands digging into my quads. 

“Am I hurting you?” I asked. 

He fell forward, his weight on his elbows, his back straining, his hips rocking. 

“Don’t--stop--” he hissed, clenching the comforter beneath him.

I damn near hit the end at that, but unleashed every bit of restraint I did or didn’t have, and held it together, although my molecules were just shy of dispersing into a puff of air. I let my hips go faster, striking him audibly, bracing myself with one hand on his hip, the other still operating a reach-around, both of us scant moments from Valhalla. 

I could feel him spasming in my hand, hear him moaning through the deafening church bells that clanged relentlessly between my ears. To my blurred sense of astonishment, he was _coming without ejaculating,_ and without even going soft. I didn’t even know that was possible. With a good-natured, fleeting jealousy, I leaned down, and kissed his neck and shoulders as he shivered, his hands squeezing fitfully in the duvet, and then collapsed to his belly on the surface of the bed. 

When he breathed my name--that’s when it was very well over and done with for me. That’s all, folks, _adios, au revoir._ I came _violently--_ like I could _feel_ every spasm as it wracked my entire body, and his, too. Each throe pulsated through my form, the aftershocks quavering outward and into him, leaving me blind and deaf and lost. I fought to remain upright and find my bearings, delirious, borderline high. When the strength went from my limbs like someone opened some tap somewhere and it all went swirling out, I rested my hands on his hips, and swiveled a little, gliding gently inward, listing a moment before I withdrew, again, reaching around to grasp his cock--and then, okay, _there_ was his own ferocious ejaculation, matching his expelled breath. I’m surprised my hand didn't wind up with a hole blasted through it. I reclined belly-first atop his back for a while, both of us just breathing in the silence of the bedroom.

I moved my weight from him when I registered how profoundly he was _shaking_ beneath me _._

“Are you okay?” I asked, sitting up beside him and resting one hand on his back. His skin had gone clammy. 

He nodded, turning to his back, laying one hand on his forehead. 

“I’m fine, Wally,” he said, his voice unsteady. 

“...You sure?” 

“I’m… I’m all right. I’ll be all right. Just… A lot’s happened today. It’s just--” He exhaled. “It’s just a lot.” He closed his palm over his face, and drew in one disconcertingly shuddering breath. “…Sorry.” 

“No, no, no, man, it’s okay,” I said, panicking a little as I reached out, and drew him to me. _Oh, God, it was too much, we overdid it, we shouldn’t have let it go this far, tomorrow he’s going to Vaguebook status “I regret everything”--_

I was enormously relieved to see that I hadn’t made him cry after all, but he _did_ seem overwrought, like _just_ on the verge of breaking down. This was another thing I never thought I’d see for as long as I lived--that I’d be holding Dick post-coitus--but, well… There we were, on his bed, butt-ass naked, with my arms wrapped around him, reaching up to stroke his hair, doing what I could to slow his trembling. 

As an aside, if I were outside of that situation, looking in through the window, I’d have probably squeaked in protest and started wildly waving my arms in a crazed WTF moment.

“So… Do you feel like talking about it?” I asked after a time, by now lying on my back against the pillows, with him leaning on my chest under my arm. 

He shook his head. “I’ll be all right. Like I said, just… a lot’s happened today. I mean--a _lot._ I’m kind of having a hard time trying to wrap my head around it all.”

I nodded. “Well, I’m right there in the boat with you, dude.”

“Yeah, but… Wally, it’s not just--us,” he said. “Not saying that isn’t a lot, just…” He sighed. “Harry… he was like family. Losing him… It took me back to some really bad places, you know? And… he knew my parents. My aunt and cousin. Apart from old Jack, there aren’t many people I know anymore that knew them. It’s like one more connection to them is gone, one more person who could help keep them _real_ in my mind. And I _still_ can’t believe he killed himself. It’s just... it’s really hard.” He paused, and smiled at me. “Err… Difficult. Difficult, that’s what I meant.”

I smiled, too, glad he was still willing to joke. “Well. The only thing I can really tell you on any of that is that it’s just going to take time. Part of the trouble you’re having with your family, though, _is_ the time aspect. Time heals all wounds, sure, but I wonder if that’s just because you kind of start to forget _why_ it hurt to lose something in the first place.”

“Yeah,” he said. “That's pretty much it.”

“Thing is, though, Dick,” I continued, “your parents, your aunt, your cousin, they _were_ real. They _are_ real. You’re living proof of that, that they existed. And look, you’re not doing anything wrong. It’s easy to kind of get sucked into real life every day and start losing the details, and I doubt your parents are going to want you to be so focused on remembering them that you forget to you know, _live_. So just… Keep doing what you can to honor them, which, honestly, I think you’re doing a pretty stellar job of so far. And the same goes for Harry.”

He looked up at me. “Wally, you’re seriously going to make me cry, here, and dude, I’ve had enough indignity for one day.”

“If you feel like it, I’m not going to judge,” I told him honestly. 

He brightened marginally, and he shook his head. “No, that’s okay. Like I said, I’ve had more than enough indignity to last me a while. Need to salvage what’s left of my poor, battered ego.” He smiled. “Thanks, though.”

I kissed his forehead. God, how _weird._

“So… Wally,” he said. 

“Hmm.”

“…We just had sex.”

I laughed, and squeezed at my temples, shaking my head. “Yep. We did.” 

“I don’t want to like, _force_ the issue, but… Now what?”

I chewed on that in silence for a moment, thinking.

The truth was, I had no idea regarding the dreaded ‘now what,’ beyond finding something to eat before my tasty bedmate started looking a bit literally so. While the guilt still threw a loud-ass _Toddlers and Tiaras_ tantrum in the back of my mind, I couldn’t bear to acknowledge it, as though by doing so, I would render this new facet, already wholly surreal, of my relationship with Dick inauthentic, false, nonexistent. While I couldn’t face myself, and definitely not Artemis, after betraying her like this, I knew there was no way I could ever face my life without this, without him, either. 

In short, I was hopelessly clueless. 

“I don’t know,” I said with a sigh. “Like I said earlier… I’ll care about that later.”

He was quiet. 

“It’ll be okay,” I told him, falsely blithe. “We’ll figure it out.”

I wasn’t real sure if I believed that, but he seemed to accept what I said. Good enough. We lay in the soft, climate controlled darkness of the bedroom for a while, not talking, but not really needing to, either. He ended up falling asleep, and, famished, I quietly extricated myself. 

I stopped in the bathroom first. Peering at myself in the mirror, face flushed through the smattering of freckles across my nose and cheeks, naked torso pale and splotched here and there, I shook my head at myself. Jesus Christ--the fucking condom was still tacked to my dick. In horror and embarrassment, I peeled the rubber away, staring at it, the forensic evidence of my malfeasance. I hurriedly flushed it, and then returned my gaze to the mirror. 

“Well, Nice Guy, it’s been real,” I muttered, and then soaped my hands and face. I wanted a shower. Well, fuck it, I figured, I doubted Dick would mind. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d made myself fully at home in his apartment. I snatched a towel from the linen closet, showered quickly, and then, with the linen around my waist, raided the fridge. 

I stood at the counter, destroying all of his leftovers, a package of cookies, a bag of donuts, and two six-packs of beer. I’d make a pretty terrible roommate. I just hoped he wouldn’t kill me for eating almost all of his food. I noticed the rubber snake, and glowered at it.

“It’s all your fault,” I said accusingly through a mouthful of strawberry frosting, narrowing my eyes at its sleek, tangled form.

I klepto’ed a gallon of ice cream after that, falling on the couch, zoning out to some TV that I paid zero attention to before I gave up. I dumped the empty carton in the trash. I was _exhausted._ Wandering around in the equatorial heat, not really eating like I should have, and busting massive nuts all over my best friend twice in less than a few hours left me feeling like finding the nearest soft surface, faceplanting there, and not being bothered for the next forty-eight hours. 

Well, to bed, then. I was beyond ready to put a cap on this weird-ass day, anyway. I headed up the steps to the garret bedroom, and, quietly and unobtrusively as I could, I slipped into the sheets next to Dick. I lay on my back for a moment, staring up at the cobalt wash of the ceiling, and then, incapable of resistance, and honestly failing to see the point in it by then, I turned to my side, and laid my arm over him, gratified when he shifted closer. 

For the barest second before I whirlpooled down into a funnel of sleep, I believed my own words--it would be okay.

*******

Morning came sluggishly after an endless torrent of nightmares, full of blood and razors and teeth and graying corpses and snakes. The black expanse of a night sky, shreds of filmy clouds scuttling frantically across the blue-white, glaring moon. Rushing water, dark and loud. Profound loneliness. A drained, bluish-lipped face with milky eyes showed up once or twice, startling me finally into full wakefulness when the burnished gold of the mid-morning sunlight brushed in long strokes through the window. 

I sat up, and noticed I was alone in bed. Rubbing sandy, heavy eyes, I heard the sound of the shower downstairs. I lay back with a thump, immediately crushingly aware that yesterday’s events were _not_ bound up in the colorful, vivid series of dreams that had plagued my sleep. I wondered if I’d have _rathered_ that parade of garish horror had been reality, chased instead by lurid, steamy sex dreams about Dick. 

The puns, though.

I sighed, and sat up. Did I work that day? I couldn’t remember. 

I slid out of bed, jogged naked down the steps, found my jeans, and pulled my phone from the back pocket. I rang my lab partner, Julian, and was standing there, in the raw, the jeans in one hand and my phone in the other, when Dick emerged from the bathroom. 

“Oh, Cripes,” I muttered, jamming the phone between my ear and shoulder, and tugged my jeans on while he snickered under his breath. He pointed at the counter, and I saw that he’d already been out and come back with food. Halle-fuckin-lujah. 

“Hey, Julian?” I said when he finally picked up.

“Wallace West, always calling when I’m actually in class.”

“Sorry. I’m kind of known for bad timing.”

“Which is why you’ll never get a date.”

“Speak for yourself, dude. Look, am I on today at the lab?”

“Well, let me just check for you, and would you like some coffee while I’m at it?” I chuckled. I’d gotten to know Julian well enough that I was well aware that he was having me on. A pause, a shuffle. “Yeah. Looks like you’re on at 1.”

“Aw, shit,” I grumbled. “Look, can you cover for me today?” 

“Need to spoon your bereaved boyfriend?”

This was a joke, but I about dropped the phone. 

“In fact, yes,” I said, recovering. “You know me, Julian, not a straight bone in my body, except the one in my pants.”

Dick slowly turned away from the coffeemaker, and lifted a brow at me. 

“Since I’m an avid gay rights activist, I’ll cover for you this time. You’re lucky my professor cancelled this afternoon,” said Julian.

“Well, I appreciate it, man, thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“I owe you one, for real this time.” I hung up, and turned to Dick. “You know, I don’t think I can handle Julian’s gay jokes about us anymore.”

He punched the button on the coffeemaker, spurring it into its hissing action. “That awkward moment when Julian’s gaydar might be a little more on point than _any_ of us realized,” he said. He leaned against the counter, facing me. “Speaking of that. How’re you doing.”

The inflection at the end removed a question mark, indicating that he was putting out more of an invitation to share my thoughts, in spite of him likely knowing what they were.

“Why are you asking me?” I asked, trying to sound light. “I mean, I’m not the one who, uh…” I paused, and pressed my hands into the corner of the counter. 

He stood in quiet, eyeing me with a humorous look. 

“Yeah, I’m not even going to finish that,” I said with a laugh. “More to the point, how are _you_ doing?”

“Me? I’m fine,” he said. “I might need one of those little rubber donut pillows for people with hemorrhoids for the next week or two, but I’m good.” 

I stared at him in mute horror for a second, and then he started laughing.

“I’m fucking with you,” he said, lifting his hands. 

“You dick,” I muttered, and reached for the food bag. I needed some energy if I was going to have this conversation with him. 

“Sorry,” he said, sounding not at all remorseful, and when I caught him grinning at me, I crumpled up a napkin and threw it at him, satisfyingly connecting with his face. 

“Well, all fucking around aside,” I said, tearing into the food as he poured a cup of coffee, “how _are_ you doing? I mean, for real.”

He was quiet for a moment, holding the cup in one hand, not drinking. 

“Wally, I really have no idea,” he said. “I’m like a glass cage of emotion, just… all conflicting, mixed feelings on the whole thing. I’m _really_ freaked out about Babs, I’m not going to lie. I know I have a rep, but dude, I’m not a cheater. Now, I’m not laboring under any false pretenses, either, here--like I _know_ I’m a whore. I _know_ I’ve fucked a lot of women. But I _don’t fuck other women.”_ He exhaled sharply. “Or men, in this case. Jeez. As if I wasn’t a big enough bicycle to begin with.” He shook his head, and rolled his eyes. “Anyway, I just… I’m not sure what I’m going to tell her. Or _if_ I’m going to at all. Part of me just wants to stuff this in a box and sit on it until the day I die.” He set the coffee cup on the counter, and braced his weight on the granite corner. “But… If I know Barbara--and trust me, I do--she’ll figure it out. I mean, I can’t even have her _look_ at me after this. She’ll _know._ Like Jaime says, ‘She a _bruja,_ she a witch!’” I snorted at his impression. “So--Wally, she’s going to be well aware of our little indiscretions, and girls _talk._ A lot. So by proxy, Artemis is going to know, too.”

I dumped the breakfast burrito, half-finished on the counter, quelling a powerful surge of guilty nausea. “…Yep.”

Dick pressed his forehead into his hands, and then looked at me. “ _God._ I can’t even _start_ on how fucking _terrible_ I feel about that part of this whole thing--Artemis is legit, straight-up one of my besties, man. I can’t…” He paused, and looked up at the ceiling, visibly collecting himself. “I don’t think I can face her any more than you can.” 

I sighed. “Well, you asked how I was doing--I can’t even add to all that. Pretty much sums the whole thing up.”

“But… the other part of me…” His expression gentled. “I _don’t_ want to stuff this in a box. I don’t want to deny it. And… I don’t want to give it up.” 

“So is this when we meet up every so often to ‘go fishing?’” I asked, making the quote motions. 

He looked at me, and tilted his head, adopting a false romance in his expression and an accent. “I wish I knew how to quit you.”

I couldn’t even bring myself to laugh, instead sighing. “In seriousness, though. Again. You pretty much hit the nail on the head.”

“I’m also… a little gayer than I thought,” he confessed, and lowered his forehead to the countertop. 

“Well, no shit, and same here,” I said. 

“No, I mean--remember I mentioned we’d _know_ we weren’t gay if we didn’t get into--” He inclined his head, and waved a hand. 

“Yeah.”

“Okay, well, I don’t know about you, but--” He expelled a huff of air. “I was into it. I was _scary_ into it.”

“…I could tell,” I said, mostly teasing. Before he could reply, I went on to admit, “I was, too, though.”

He half-smiled, and I felt those annoying butterflies that just wouldn’t quit assaulting me when I noticed the altered set of his features--the warmth in his eyes that was simultaneously guileless and intense, the lowered brows, the relaxed mouth, the way he subtly angled toward me. His romantic body language. I inhaled, recalling the auroral, shifting blues of his eyes in the light from the window the night before, the parted lips, the languid musculature in his face--that supposed Look that women say men get when they’re genuinely macking on them. I returned his half-smile, endeared only more to him, now, as I got to know him in ways I never would have otherwise. I wondered if I had my own version of that Look, and, with equal curiosity, if he’d noticed it. 

“Which brings me to my original point,” he said, startling me out of my thoughts. “What now.”

I sighed, and rocked on the barstool, looking up at the ceiling. 

“Dude, I don’t know,” I said, deciding not to go into what I _wanted_ “what now” to entail, rubbing my forehead. “When is Harry’s funeral?”

“Not ‘til next Friday.” He sighed. “The ME’s doing a post-mortem first.”

A twang rippled through my middle as I thought, _Well, I’ve made my big gay bed, and now I must slumber gayly in it. Dive right in, Wall-man…_

“Well, do you have any plans for the weekend?” I asked.

He shrugged. “I have a review and audit of a network for Kord-Tech, but that will only take a few hours. Why?”

I swiveled, and faced him directly. “Because… I just called off work and have jack shit nothing to do until Monday.”

He smiled. “…And?”

“And to be honest, I don’t really feel like facing the music right this red hot second. I just kind of want to hide out until I absolutely can’t get away with hiding out anymore.” I looked over at him. “And by hide out… I mean I want to ride this high for as long as I can before I have to answer for it.” I thumped the barstool under me. “Call me greedy, but I’m not willing to get castrated with some blunt, rusty object until I have a _little_ more to put in my Spank Bank for the future.” 

“That a come-on, KF?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know, do you want it to be, Boy Wonder?”

He was silent for a second, and then surprised me when he burst out laughing.

“Dude, what the hell?” I asked after a moment, affected by his mirth, laughing, too.

“Sorry, just…” He took a breath. “So this is us.”

I nodded, going all warm and fuzzy. “Yep. This is us.”

“And when you say you want to ride this high as long as possible, does this mean I get to like… have you all to myself this weekend? I mean, dare I dream?”

I stood, and grandiosely gestured to my shirtless form. “Dude, _allllll_ this--it’s yours, all weekend.”

He vaulted gleefully over the counter--show-off--and about bowled me off my feet when he bodily attacked me, and I swear I heard the holy choir as they celebrated _with_ me in that moment.

I was pretty astonished at how _quickly_ I ended up chomping at the bit for a reverse repeat of the night before when, mid-way through what was a rapidly mounting snogfest, I wound up on my back atop his counter, getting dry-humped hard enough that an orgasm wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. I was breathing with increasing frenzy into the crook of his neck as his lips pressed at my jawline, moving to my ear, his hands tugging at the buckle of my jeans, when a knock fell on the door. 

“Oh, shit,” he hissed, and flailed to disentangle from me.

I snaked my arms around him. “Dude, just ignore it.”

Another knock, a hair more insistent this time, and he pulled back. 

“It might be Bruce, and you know he’ll just bust in here if he feels like it,” he said under his breath, straightening his clothes and running a hand through his mussed hair as he headed to the door. I sat up on the counter, straightening my arms at my sides, taking a breath. I was agonizingly hard in my jeans, and the heat in my body still flared up and concentrated in my neck and face. Ugh. _Misery._ And who knew how long this interruption would take. 

I gritted my teeth when I heard the sound of the door. 

“Oh, hey, Z,” I heard him say, and I looked over to catch sight of Zatanna. 

“Hey, Boy Wonder,” she said, kissing his cheek. They hugged and chatted for a moment at the entryway, and, craning my neck, I saw that she had a truckload of stuff in her arm. It looked like food and games and books and the like. 

I know--this is normally the moment when the new love interest gets pissy when the old one, supposedly platonic and non-threatening, shows up and exhibits old evidence of their once unshakeable bond. Don’t worry--none of that here.

“Figured you could use like a… grief-centric care package?” She laughed. “The Zebra Cakes are from Raquel.”

“Aw, that’s sweet of you guys, thanks,” he said. 

“You’re welcome. How’re you holding up?”

“I’m hanging in there,” he replied. “One day at a time.” 

Zatanna nodded, then looked past his shoulder, and waved to me. “Hi, Wally.”

“What’s up, Z,” I replied, lifting a hand. 

“You want to come in for a minute?” Dick asked, and I pretty much died inside at that. _Oh, come on, man,_ I thought, exponentially annoyed. _You’re not seriously inviting the ultimate fucking cock block in here…_

“Just for a second,” she said, “I’m meeting Artemis and M’gann shortly in Happy Harbor to run. I’ll just come in and drop these off.”

Ah, I could have kissed her. I just prayed she wouldn’t pick up on any incriminating vibes and report them to my girlfriend. I subtly ran a body check on myself--fly, up. Button, clasped. Hard-on, not visible in my position. 

She came inside, and slowed as she made her way to the counter. Her brows furrowed, and she paused, clearly confused and distracted, as though she heard a voice that spoke only to her, and in a language that she couldn’t comprehend. She deposited the goods on the counter, and laid a hand against her head. 

“Umm… Guys?” she said. “I don’t… I don’t know how to tell you this, but… I’m picking up on, like… a _serious_ magical frequency in here.”

Dick frowned. “What do you mean?”

She shook her head. “I’m not… I’m not really sure. But whatever it is, it’s _really_ strong. Like… _scary_ strong. Not quite _dark_ magic, but… close. Like, hedging toward it.” She ground two fingers into her temple. “Neutral evil, maybe…”

I leaned forward. It had taken a pretty intense personal experience and a stay within the helmet of Fate for me to even acknowledge the existence of magic. Apart from the fact that I’ll never be a doubting Thomas again, something about it since has always lit up a deeply reverent respect in me--sort of like the enormous bodybuilder all at once humbled by the presence of a powerful Clydesdale. The idea that some sort of questionable magic was floating around the room made me feel immediately ill at ease, and frankly, Zatanna’s suddenly skittish, unsettled demeanor wasn’t helping matters. 

“Have you, um… Have you brought anything home, lately? Or taken something from someone, anything like that?” Zatanna asked.

There was a pause.

“Oh, you know what, actually, yeah,” Dick said. 

“Okay, what?” She looked relieved to have some direction. “And where is it?”

“Oh, God, the snake,” I declared, skittering off the countertop. 

Dick led Zatanna to the rubber snake, where it lay in a tangled pile on the granite surface next to Dick’s tepid coffee cup. 

Her lips tightened as she studied it.

“Oh, yeah, this is it,” she said. “Hold on…”

She lifted her hands, holding them out to hover palms-down over the serpentine shape. 

“ _Llet em ruoy terces,”_ she murmured, gazing intently at the snake. 

In an instant, all of the blood drained from her face, and she looked up at us where we stood across the island from her, both of us springloaded, braced for what she was about to say.

“Did you both touch this?” she asked.

“Yeah,” I said, inclining my head. 

“Umm… So what have you guys been doing?” she asked slowly, her tones measured, her eyes flickering from Dick to me. 

I got defensive. 

“This and that,” I said snappishly. “Bro stuff. Why?”

She pointed at the snake. “Because, Wally, you guys both just got _seriously_ whammied.”

  
  
  



	3. Act 3: Forbidden Fruit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hullo! ^_^
> 
> This was... harder than I thought. 
> 
> Initially, this entire story was meant to be kind of humorous--one of those awkward sexual scenarios that people look back on and cringe good-naturedly at, with some fluff thrown in. However, as I worked through this project, and in particular this chapter, I realized, "Oh, wow, this isn't funny at all. AT ALL." 
> 
> *cue emotional turmoil* 
> 
> *cue getting LOST in said turmoil* XD
> 
> Ah, well. Hopefully it turned out okay for all of my struggles with it. :-) 
> 
> Enjoy, all! <3 
> 
> Xoxoxoxoxoxo  
> ~EF <3

“I’m sorry, what do you mean, ‘whammied?’” asked Dick.

“Yeah, sorry, what?” I echoed. 

Zatanna eyed me, the color rising a little in her cheeks. 

“Well,” she said, visibly uncomfortable, “let me ask you again. What have you guys been doing?”

“Zatanna--just cut to the chase, okay?” I said, impatient and heated. “What the hell do you mean by whammied?”

“Okay,” she said. “What I’m getting from this snake--which is _powerfully_ enchanted, by the way, like I may have to go seek help in dispelling that thing--is that the spell on it is intended to instill just… absolutely _overwhelming_ feelings of lust on whoever touches it.”

My stomach splattered all over the floor--or at least, it felt like it did. My knees went weak and gelatinous. I _felt_ the blood pouring from my face as the hot, bubbling sickness barreled from my gut into my chest. 

“I’m sorry, what?” Dick said, his words issued slowly, as though with painstaking care.

“Just that,” Zatanna replied. “Like any person that comes into contact with this snake, they’re going to pretty much go crazy with the need to just get busy with everyone and everything. That lamp? Got to hump it. That couch? Got to screw it. Not much around the poor unwitting jerk would be safe from those spellbound urges. He’d stick it in a bowl of soup whether it were warm enough or not.” 

I fell onto the barstool at the counter, and pressed my face into my hands. “Oh, my God,” I breathed, the bile pressing at the back of my throat, foaming up now from my chest. I held my body stock still--if I moved a fingernail, I’d vomit all over the place. 

“Zatanna, are you sure?” Dick asked, his voice dark, treading on dangerous. He didn’t blow his top often--but I knew the signs, and, trust me, he was centimeters from it. For his part, he was whiter and more transparent than skimmed milk, the only color in his skin the angry, ruddy blooms of red in his face. Every muscle was drawn up tight, shaking perceptibly, his eyes livid--actually frightening. If I weren’t right there with him in the wake of this horrifying overload of gut-turning information, I might have hit the deck.

“Dick, there’s no doubt,” she said, lifting her hands in a conciliating manner. “From what I’m picking up, the idea behind this spell is to… _unleash_ the energy given off by sex. I’m not sure what for. Harvesting, feeding, who knows, it’s really anyone’s guess--I’d have to look into it a bit more, and not just for info. This is indicative of something _truly_ scary--like the League might need to get involved. Where did you get this snake?” 

Dick didn’t speak, just stood, shaking, breathing fitfully, his fists clenched, the flesh stretching over the knuckles. He looked just as close to baptizing the floor as I was, where I sat reeling on the stool, barely anchored by the death grip I kept on the counter’s edge, one wrong move from laughing like a fucking hyena or wailing like La Llorona. 

_It might be funny,_ I told myself in a panic, _come on, dude, you gotta see the humor in it, someday you might look back on this and laugh--_

Oh, _hell_ no, I wouldn’t--not after how far we’d taken it and all the rampant feelings that got tossed around the night before and just that morning. Dick, for his part, was whitening by the second, his skin bordering on bluish, a stark contrast to his suddenly _very_ black hair.

Zatanna, reacting to the brimming turmoil, softened.

“Oh, God, Dick, I’m so sorry,” she murmured. “Look… I won’t ask any more questions, okay? This really is too much right now, I mean, it would be for _anybody,_ and with what you’ve just gone through…” She clasped his stiff, unmoving forearm. “I’ll just, umm… I’ll go look into it, and I’ll get back with you on it when you’re ready. In the meantime… I should probably take the snake and see if I can get rid of it.” 

“…I’ll be right back,” he said dully, and he stalked in a swift path to the bathroom. Not a second after the door crashed shut with a tremendous bang that probably set off an earthquake in Thailand, the slam of the toilet seat rattled the lampshades, and he audibly got sick. My skin crawled, scuttled, shifted. I could _taste_ my own vomit welling in my mouth, threatening an appearance. 

“Jesus Christ,” I moaned, and then, for the first time in a _long_ time, almost a year, in fact, I was crying.

I just felt so _violated._ So upturned, so degraded, so objectified. And _not_ by Dick--God, _none_ of this was his fault. Not even close. He was every bit as innocent and hapless a victim in this as I was--if not more so, I realized, as all the thoughts went blasting through my head like a volley of missiles. That he was grieving and lost and hurt and _so vulnerable_ \--I got so _fucking mad_ the onslaught of tears was unavoidable. That’s not even considering the horrible, unstomachable evils imparted on Artemis and Babs--what the actual hell were we going to tell them now? “Oh, hey, NBD, we just chipped our teeth and putted from the rough last night because some douche magician wanted who-knows-what from sexual energy!” (Insert big, cheesy grin!) I choked on a sob. How could _anyone_ do this? _Why_ would they? What was _wrong_ with them? There was no consideration here, none--it was just _inhuman._ I dropped my head to the counter, my shoulders rolling. Like I said, I don’t cry much--but when I do, I don’t do it halfway. It’s like I save it all for twice-a-year sobfests like this one. And honestly--this about did me in.

“Wally, I’m so sorry,” Zatanna said helplessly. She sat down, and laid a hand on my wrist. “Look. I don’t want to push either of you, but if we’re going to figure this out, I’ll need _something_ to go on. Can you tell me a little bit about what happened? I promise, I won’t say a _word_ to Artemis or Babs. Or anyone. You don’t have to get into anything that makes you uncomfortable, I just… I need some direction here if I’m going to help unravel this, okay?”

I pushed her hand away. “ _Please_ just give me a second.”

She nodded, and respectfully backed away a few paces. When I looked up, she, again, laid a hand on my wrist. 

“So… What happened?”

I told her, sickened, humiliated. She didn’t gasp, fan herself, laugh, or even lift her eyebrows. She just held my hand in both of hers, listening in total silence, absorbing the story with a forbearance that only fed the waterworks. How many times had she held Artemis’ hands when she cried about something, I wondered suddenly before I was even done regaling her, and if this secret ever came out, would Zatanna hold Artemis’ hands as she cried again? And here it was, my turn to capitalize on Zatanna’s support, after I’d just cheated on her best friend with mine. When I finished, she squeezed my fingers, not releasing them.

“So the snake came from the Phantom Theater at Amusement Mile in Gotham?” she verified, and I nodded. Dick wandered out of the bathroom like a drifting ghost, his skin like a see-through swatch of white and his hair like wheeling, inky shadows. He passed me silently, trailing the scents of soap and Listerine, and sat with a thump at his kitchen table, a good way off from where I sat at the island. He buried his head in his arms. Zatanna wound up standing by him, running a hand over his back. 

“Sorry,” he said finally, leaning back in his seat, drawing a breath in through his nose, and releasing it from his mouth.

“No, no, it’s okay,” she said. “Look, a lot of this isn’t sitting well with me, not talking about the obvious. The suicides, for example.”

“You think they’re connected to that snake?” Dick asked.

“Maybe not the snake in specific, but the sorcerer who enchanted it. Rash of suicides in Gotham, and then you guys turn up whammied into doing things you normally wouldn’t do? I just can’t imagine there’s not some thread somewhere.”

“Harry wasn’t the suicidal type, either,” Dick said. Although he sounded somewhat more interested, his tone remained half-hearted at best. “And he was at Amusement Mile before he died.”

Zatanna nodded. “See--the plot thickens. Listen, I’ll get out of here and let you guys kind of figure this part of things out. When I have some answers, I’ll call. And now, saying this as a friend, and entirely joking, probably in poor taste--don’t do anything I wouldn’t do. Okay?”

Dick nodded, and Zatanna, by use of some spell, levitated the snake into a bag, and then quietly left. The door clicked shut, the sound deafening, sepulchral. 

The silence went on, and on, and on. Thousands of cars whirred by on the streets below. Clouds rolled in and curtained the sun. Rain, oppressive and soaking, came and went. Bile surged and receded at the back of my throat. I remained silent, staring at the floor, as my thoughts moved from the horrific feeling that I’d lost all of my free will and agency and been puppeted into cheating on my girlfriend by fucking my best friend for who-knew-why. I wasn’t even remotely ready to start dwelling on the greater ramifications of this magical whammying--the suicides, the deaths, what they meant, why they happened, what nefarious purposes drove the malefactor behind them. 

Well. One thing at a time. I lifted my phone, and sent Zatanna a text. 

_Hey. When you get rid of that snake, will the effects of the spell stop?_

My cell buzzed on the surface of the counter a few minutes later.

 _Yes,_ read Zatanna’s reply. _Called off the run and am working on it. Going well, actually am able to destroy it without any help. Should be clear in the next hour._

I texted: _Let me know the second we’re good._

Her answer: _Will do, but don’t worry, you should be able to tell. It’ll be okay, Wally <3_

I listlessly stared at the screen of my phone, and heaved a tremendous sigh. 

The thing was, all that had happened the day before, that had almost happened that morning, it didn’t _feel_ like lust. Some of it, okay, sure. But I’ve experienced lust before, oh, _plenty_ of times--I mean, it really doesn’t take all that much to set me off. Namely, a nice set of funbags in a cute little lacey bra plastered on a ginormous advertisement--I’m looking at you, Victoria’s Secret, thanks for earning me the stank-eye from my girlfriend more times than I can count. However, from that first moment that I had kissed Dick in that car inside the Phantom Theater, I can tell you with confidence that it hadn’t just been lust driving my actions. Holding him the night before, feeling him trembling against my torso, kissing his forehead, cuddling into him, sleeping the night through locked around him, even just goofing off with him that morning--the feeling that colored and characterized those memories sure as hell wasn’t _lust._

But then, who really knew. I ground my fingers into my forehead. Maybe it was just the bromance feels I’d always had for him, tricking me into believing that they were something more by donning garments of intimacy. Somehow, the possibility of that hurt me even more, that some cocksmoke magic-abuser somewhere would take my feelings for my best friend and twist and pervert them so casually. And at a time that Dick was so _open_ to attack, and in a way that would destroy our relationships--with our girlfriends, with each other, with _everyone._ If I ever found this guy--I clenched my fists, the knuckles straining--oh, he was going to fucking _pay._ I’d cut his nuts off, and I really thought I’d do it if given the opportunity. I’d joke and say I’d sentence him to one of Dr. Palmer’s lectures, but this was beyond any acceptable point of facetiousness. 

“Can I tell you something,” Dick said suddenly into the humid, dense air, interrupting my uncomfortable reverie. “That… might or might not be totally off-putting.”

“Nothing you say is going to be off-putting,” I murmured, fighting another onset of tears. I just prayed he wasn’t going into full detective mode on me, taking pages from Bruce’s book and hiding behind the mask, because frankly, I wasn’t in the damn mood to start chatting clues and shit.

“Look. Wally…” Dick said, his voice barely over a whisper. 

“Hmm.”

“What happened yesterday… It didn’t…” He shifted in his seat, the wood creaking in the cavernous room. “It didn’t _feel_ like…”

“It didn’t feel like lust,” I finished for him, dumping my phone on the granite countertop with an abrupt clatter. 

“No,” he agreed. “No, it didn’t. _At all._ And dude--lust is pretty much a second language for me. Like, I _know_ the difference between lust and love, okay?”

My heart lurched. 

“ _None_ of it felt like lust to me,” he continued. “Even the-the--” He exhaled. “Even the sex. I just… I just wanted…”

I looked over at him when he trailed off. When he didn’t continue, I prompted, “What?”

“Wally, I just wanted to _be_ with you.” He pushed his face into his hands, and then looked at me. “I _still_ want to. If that’s whatever voodoo is stuck all over that snake, or if that’s me and what _I_ want, I don’t know--but let’s say I touched you right now and it didn’t devolve into sex? I’d be _fine_ with it. I don’t feel the need to just rip your clothes off and fuck you into next month. Would I say no if it came to that? Okay, maybe not, but it would be because--because I want to--” He issued a frustrated sound. “God. I can’t even say it. But… There it is. I want to be with you, I want to touch you, and by touch you, I _don’t_ mean sex. I _dare_ you to sit there and tell me that shit is lust. Because sorry--I disagree.”

I fought tears again. I shared his feelings--all of them. Every. Single. One. If I was only sure that I was acting on my own volition, that some grody sorcerer’s sticky little bitch fingers weren’t pulling my strings, I’d have gone to him, given myself to him a hundred percent without compunction, to hell with the fact that my Facebook profile still read “In a Relationship with Artemis C.” I sat on the stool, my seat going numb atop it, my stomach whirling in steady, egg beater circles. I could _feel_ the hard, humming warmth of his chest under my cheek, the silk of his hair in my hands--but more so, I was awash with how often he’d had me laughing until I thought I’d implode and get lost in some sort of limbo reverse Speed Force, how he’d thrown himself in harm’s way for my sake so many times I’d never be able to tally them, that we could coast together in combat in wordless communion, a model of perfect synergy. How we could sit in complete silence with equally complete comfort, never requiring constant interaction. How we could just as easily talk for twelve, thirteen-hour stretches with zero difficulty when put to the task. And I’d heard, not just from Artemis and our friends, but from his own mouth, that he had grieved my loss, however temporary it was, so profoundly he had literally put his _entire life_ on hold. That knowledge alone was pretty humbling. Not even bringing up the fact that he was all too often a freaking pietist to me even when I was a total jerk to him--always calm, always level. My balancing act. 

God. _My best friend._

Even when I was so furious with him over his decisions and actions during the Reach invasion, in retrospect it wasn’t hard for me to figure out that I wasn’t just pissed about the enormous risks for Artemis and his apparent disrespect for our choices. I was livid watching him unwittingly transform into something I was well aware he never wanted to become (e.g. Batman, an asshole, an actual dick, etc.), all the while powerless to stop his decline, however strenuously I tried. I was so terrified that those shifts would see not only my girlfriend and our friends killed--but also that _Dick would be lost to me._ Be that through death… or just as the person I knew. People change, sure--but to objectionable levels of unrecognizability? It was the one thing I could never swallow, that horrible sense of not knowing who he was anymore, and the suffocating feeling of devastating loss that came with it. 

I felt that fear again, sitting at the island in his apartment, that same sense that I could lose him at any moment, that I had a weak, two-fingered grasp on his slippery form as he was yanked double-fisted in the opposite direction by some far more powerful, invisible being. I covered my face with my hands, and loosed a sigh. 

“But dude,” I said finally, trying not to reveal too much of my own inner turmoil, “that brings us to a whole new set of 99 problems. What the hell does it mean if a lust spell cast on us doesn’t end up feeling like lust?”

He shook his head with a helpless expression.

“I’m so confused,” I muttered, rubbing my forehead, closing my eyes. 

“Me, too,” Dick said quietly. 

My phone buzzed. I checked it.

 _Snake’s destroyed, no traces of any sorcery. Anyone who came into contact with it should be out from under its thrall. You guys should be in the clear._

“Apparently, the spell’s broken,” I announced, and sat for a moment, trying to determine if I felt any differently. 

I didn’t.

“…Crap,” I muttered a little dispassionately, and met Dick’s gaze when I caught him staring. 

“Any change?” he asked. 

I shook my head. “Nope.”

“…Me, either.”

“Well, this just keeps getting more fucked up with every second that goes by.”

He nodded, stood, and walked over to the window, crossing his arms over himself. I texted Zatanna.

_Z, neither of us is feeling any differently. You sure destroying the snake would do the trick?_

I sat in agonizing, stomach-twisting suspense, waiting for her reply, staring at the straight, solid planes of Dick’s back, well-formed and architectural, even through the easy draping of his tee-shirt. I had felt, for a brief spate of moments, some exoneration, knowing that the infidelity, the sex, the crossing of that line wasn’t by any conscious decision of ours. But it died fast upon the realization that, after that arbitrary influence was rendered moot, _I felt no different._ What did _that_ mean? Honestly--I was scared to find out.

When my phone buzzed, I snatched it up, looking at the screen. 

_I’m positive. I got all the specs of the spell through scrying. What do you mean, you don’t feel any different?_

I replied: _Just what I said._

Her last text before I thumped the phone down in frustration: … _Yeah, I got nothing. Listen, I’m still looking into it, I’m sure I’ll find something <3 Hang in there, okay? _

The silence continued, punctuated by the sounds of the cars and horns and voices, the occasional siren, the rain that came and went. It was full-on storming by the time I stood up, walked over to him, and made him jump when I spoke from behind him. 

“Fuck, you scared me,” he sighed hoarsely, turning his gaze back to the window.

“Dick,” I murmured. “Turn around, just for a second, okay?”

He looked over his shoulder, not meeting my eye. 

“…Why.”

I reached out in front of me, wrapping my arms around his waist, laying my cheek against the warm, solid mass of his shoulder. 

“I just… I need to know.” My question, though, was answered just by that one motion--I never wanted to let him go for as long as I lived, not until trumpets sounded and God smote my soul for willfully engaging in extracurricular hanky-panky.

He was ramrod stiff under my arms, and not in the fun way.

“Dick. Please.”

He was still for a moment, and then, finally, turned, facing me. My arms still rested in a loose hold around his waist. I gazed at him, studying the drained skin, the eyes that shifted tumultuously in color like blue, boiling pools. I could _see_ the torment in his face, feel the affliction in the set of his stance. I drew him nearer to me. 

“Wally,” he murmured, resisting by way of one palm pressed to my chest. “Stop.”

That was all it took, that one goddamn word, and I was perilously close to the dam breaking for the second time that day. Total honesty, a record in crying for this guy. 

“Dick--”

“Don’t do this to me,” he begged. “Not now, not until we know what the _fuck_ is going on here.”

“Dick--what if we _never_ know what the fuck’s going on here?” I protested forcefully. “How the hell are we ever going to know what this is if we don’t at least _try_ to figure it out?”

“We _are_ trying to figure it out,” he snapped. “We--”

“You said it yourself, it doesn’t feel like-like--” I gestured and exhaled. “That. It doesn’t. What does it _mean,_ then?”

He gave me the same helpless look from before.

“Dick--I can’t stand not knowing,” I said. “I _have_ to know. It can’t be for nothing. It can’t _mean_ nothing. It’s not because it having some meaning is like _poof_ it’s okay, it just--it just… God.” I gazed at him, desperate, tightening my hold. “Please just tell me that it fucking _means_ something.”

This time, he took both my arms, and removed them. He stepped away. 

“Wally,” he said, “ _please_ stop.”

My arms dropped to my sides, and in that moment, I swear on God and sunny Jesus that I could _feel_ my heart as it broke in a big, bloody tear right up the middle, and I stood there in front of him like a bewildered child, totally crushed and defeated. Then, in my humiliation, I was crying yet again like an overgrown man-baby. My knees weakened when I realized how ridiculously _stupid_ I had to appear to be, how desperate, how sad. That’s usually a call to rally and get it together, but after the events of the day, I was on the emotional bender from hell. I had never actually been rejected like that before. 

Okay--so sure. I’d flirted emptily a lot over the years and as such had smashed into my fair share of stone walls. But the fact was--it was just kind of a game I played, acting dumb to impress chicks. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t. It _never_ mattered. It was just for fun and the times my throw-away jokes hit the marks made me feel good. But if any of the girls _really_ took my vacuous flirting with them seriously, I was pretty mortified. But this--I had _never_ been literally pushed away and told to stop. 

So, to sum it up, I totally lost it. I just couldn’t wrap my head around it--this new and frankly horrible feeling of going _splat_ into a windshield. And since when did _Dick_ keep his wang in the hangar? Never mind that I was a guy. (I’m kidding, saying that, but… only kind of. Ha, ha.) It took me a second of standing there, streaming tears into the heels of my hands, hitching like a toddler who just dropped his ice cream cone, before I noticed that he was crying, too.

“Wally--goddammit…”

I didn’t look up at this. I just tried getting my shit together from behind the cover of my hands. I felt his fingers on my arm, and this time, _I_ pulled away, shaking my head, tears and snot roaming unchecked all over my face and palms.

A minute ticked by, maybe two. 

Then, I lowered my hands, and swiped at my soaked cheeks. I sniffed loudly like a totally puerile doofus. I studied him, where he stood, looking every bit as pitiful and lost as I felt. 

Slowly, silently, I went to him. He didn’t push me away. 

I buried my face in his neck, my arms enfolding tight about him. I took in the scent of his skin, his hair, filling myself with it, the fabric of his tee soft under my bare chest. 

“Wally, I love Barb,” he said, his voice tortured. 

I just held him tighter. 

“Damn it--I love her--” 

I wrapped him up still tighter. 

“At this point, we _really_ can’t do this--”

“Can you shut up-- _I_ love Artemis,” I said. “I get it, Dick.”

I drew back, and we just stared at each other, transmutated for the moment into pathetic, lovesick teens.

Finally, he kissed me, and I all but dissolved into it, losing all sense of time, space, self. The thunder crashed outside, the rain drove violently against the floor-to-ceiling window, the lightning lit up the apartment like a midday rave party. I shivered against him, reaching up, curling my fingers in his hair.

I quit caring whether it was lust or something else, if all of this was of my own willingness or not, when he drew his tongue over mine, stroking the roof of my mouth. I bit into his lower lip, pulling, digging my fingertips into his shoulders. 

I broke away first.

“…Was that so hard,” I prodded.

“Yes.”

I smiled.

He straightened, inhaled, exhaled. His hands relaxed on my waist, and then, suddenly, he pulled me to him, his arms enveloping my shoulders. I rested my head on his chest, absorbing his warmth, sighing a little when he stroked my hair.

"Sorry," he murmured, his voice a hardly perceptible whisper.

I shook my head, and we stood like that for a long time, unspeaking in the sound of the storm outside. 

He drew back after a time, and clasped my face. “God. Sorry I made you cry.”

“I got something in my eye,” I told him with a shrug, then wiped at my still-streaming eyes. "It's all right, Dick. Really."

He, at last, smiled, too, and again, drew me close.

“Listen…" I told him, my voice muffled against his chest, "like I said. We’ll figure it out.”

I felt the movement as he nodded. “I’ll accept that. In the meantime… I think we have some gumshoeing to do while we wait for Zatanna.”

“Figure out what the bigger picture is?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Count me in.”


	4. Act 4: Tree of Knowledge

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! <3 
> 
> Updating a bit early... I'd like to shift my update schedule to the middle of the week, because that's a bit more of a convenient time for me. <3 Working ahead has its conveniences. :D Hope you guys don't mind! <3
> 
> Caveat: There is legit the cheesiest freaking line ever in this chapter, that I just kind of threw in and figured I'd rewrite while editing... however, I wound up having such a grand time with Wally's exposition and reaction to said line that I decided to just leave it as was. :D There's not a whole lot of dignity in the sack and in romance, anyway, amirite? :P ;D
> 
> In the meantime... Enjoy some gumshoeing and mad lovin' between these two. :D
> 
> Much love, darlings!! <3 
> 
> ~EF <3

“So,” I said, looking over Dick’s shoulder at the map of Gotham brought up on the iPad on the kitchen table, “Harry.”

“Yep. So we have Harry,” he said, indicating the first area on the map, highlighted in red, “who turned up here, by Westward Bridge.”

“Similar exsanguination occurred three miles up the way, in the Garment District,” I observed, pointing to another area, highlighted in blue. “This one was a sweatshop worker?”

“Factory worker,” Dick said wryly. “Don’t let anyone hear you breathe the word ‘sweatshop.’” 

“Hey, man, if the boot fits,” I said. 

“That part of it’s been dealt with. We actually might want to hold off on fingering this one--”

“That’s what he said.”

He continued, unperturbed, although I saw his lip flicker, “--because unlike Harry, this girl _did_ exhibit some suicidal ideations _because_ of the horrible work conditions she was stuck in. Still, like him, she had the same lacerations down her wrists, and very little blood evidence for it.”

“Was there an explanation for the blood evidence being gone?”

“Just that maybe her body was moved. There’s the idea that she killed herself in the factory and her manager found her, panicked, and then moved her body. As far as Harry goes, the accepted reasoning behind the lack of blood evidence was the river.”

“So when did this girl die?”

“About two weeks ago, and then at the end of May, this kid here--” he indicated the thumbnail photograph at the bottom of the iPad screen, “turns up dead _here--”_ He pointed out the area of the map highlighted in green. 

“Why are these being called suicides if there’s suspicious blood evidence?”

Dick closed a hand over his chin. “I’m not sure they _are_ being called suicides at this point…”

He ran upstairs, tapped wildly on his computer, whooped ecstatically, and then came racing back down, carrying his laptop. 

“Get a load of this,” he said, opening the computer. “See these? Case files.”

I looked. “Man, you are Rembrandt. I don’t even think the Hacktivists can get into the GCPD.” 

“They can’t,” Dick said, “because _I’m_ the one the GCPD hired on contract to do their network security. No one’s breaking in but me.”

“Did I mention I’m a sapiosexual?” I gave him a smirk. “That intelligence, though…”

He affectedly waved a hand. “Oh, stop it, you.”

I laughed, and then lit on bold print on the file he’d brought up on his laptop. I pointed. “Well, look at that…”

“Unofficially declared suicides, but cases are remaining open because of _suspicion of foul-fucking-play._ And not just foul play, but possible connections between this case, that case, and the list goes on, all the way down to Harry.” He slammed the table. “Boom. I should have done this days ago.”

“You weren’t really firing on all four, dude.”

“If I even _had_ four to begin with. What was that about that intelligence?”

“Friend dying and other friends doubting the circumstances behind said friend dying will do that,” I said, and squeezed his shoulder. “The question is, other than _how_ these people died, what’s the connection between all of them.”

He rubbed at his stubble in a familiar gesture. “All I’m seeing so far is the time frame. It’s roughly every two to four weeks that a new body turns up. It hasn’t been going on for real long--only since the beginning of the year, and the vics themselves have about as much in common with each other as a dog and a plant. And then if you look at all the places the bodies turned up--they’re all varied, too, like one’s on Alderaan and one’s out in the Dagobah System. So far the only common denominator is the MO.”

“So… once or twice a month, an exsanguinated body.”

He frowned. “What was it that Zatanna said about the sexual energy? That whoever cast the spell on that snake might have been feeding off of it?”

“I think she mentioned something like that.”

He was silent, his brows furrowed. 

“Can I ask something painfully obvious?” I queried. I knew I was interrupting him as he connected the dots inside his head, but a thought had occurred to me. 

“Go for it.”

“Does Bruce know about all this?”

He straightened. “I can’t imagine he doesn’t--and now the question is, why the hell didn’t he bring it up to me when Harry died?” He swiped his phone from the table. “Be right back. Time for my monthly pow-wow with my foster dad.”

“You sure you feel like talking to him right now?”

“No, but I’m going to.”

“Dude, you’re upset, you’re grieving, the last twenty-four hours have been some of the most messed up ever, and serious question, when’s the last time you ate?”

He grimaced. “…Uh, I plead the Fifth.” 

“Meaning too long.”

“I don’t remember, to be honest.”

“Jeez, and you were riding _me_ about that.”

“Yeah, you wish.”

“Don’t tempt me this early in the day. Anyway, you want me to talk to Bruce for you?”

“No, I got it, but I love you for asking,” he said, and as he headed outside to the balcony, I slumped into a chair, and let my forehead hit the tabletop.

“Yeah, I love you, too, dude,” I grumbled, and watched through the window as his form shifted back and forth on the porch. I listened to the muffled sounds of his voice as it raised several decibels. Yep. His foster dad knew. It was anyone’s guess as to why Bruce had kept that info to himself. Typical Batman.

Dick walked back inside, placed his phone on the end table, picked up a pillow from the couch, and screamed into it. 

“So… What was the old bat’s reasoning behind a cryptic douchebag this time?” I asked. 

“‘Dick, I knew there would be no way you’d be able to keep your emotions out of this one,’” he said in Bruce’s monotone. “‘You have too much personal investment. Let me handle it.’” He savagely hurled the pillow into the back of the couch. It bounced helplessly to the floor. “Jesus! Do he and Babs like, sit there and talk about me or some shit--at least Jay and Tim stay out of it, minus the odd text message asking how I’m doing. Or phone call, in Alfred’s case.” 

He made his way over to the table, sat with a thud, and, mirroring my own actions, thumped his head on the surface of the table. 

I opted to just keep ignoring any allusion to either of our girlfriends. 

“Kaldur still have you on leave?” I asked. 

He nodded. “Yeah, and thank God. I’m cleared until the Monday after next.”

“Damn. Generous.” I stood up. “You look like crap, dude.”

“Thanks,” he said sourly, glowering. 

“I’m serious. Look, we’ve been at this a while. You need to eat before you shrivel up and die.”

“Look, I’m busy. I’ll eat after I _have_ shriveled up and died.” He looked up at me. “Wally, speaking of that--I have a theory, but it sounds about as likely as little green men from Mars.”

I arched a brow at him.

He gestured. “That aren’t J’onn.”

“So what is it?”

“I’m not completely ready to voice it yet.”

“Well, then if you’re going to pull a Batman on me here and fail to share the sordid inner workings of your brain, let’s go _eat_. If not for your sake, at least for mine, because _this_ brain--” I tapped my temple, “is on strike until I get some noms. Do I need to get down on my knees and beg?”

He swiveled, and faced me. “I don’t know, what does kneeling and ‘begging’ entail?”

I snorted. “Sorry, Boy Wonder, gotta buy me dinner first.”

“Fine,” he said, rising. “Let’s get out of here, then.”

“You know,” I said, “the last time some variation of those words were spoken…”

“Dude, I thought you said I had to buy you dinner first.”

Dear God. We were _flirting._

I was going to _burn_ by the end of that weekend, I thought, but I laughed, and we got ready to leave. 

*******

“So what was your theory?” I asked, contemplating the placebo alcohol in front of me. “The one you didn’t want to share?”

Dick inclined his head. “Umm… Honestly, I’m still not sure I want to share--at least, not yet. I’d rather have more evidence first.”

“You don’t need evidence to suggest a theory.”

“Dude--just trust me, it’s already going to sound totally off the reservation. I’d like to have at least _some_ data to back me up when I present my theory to the board.”

“The board being…”

“You, yourself, and you.”

“You know, man--we work with aliens. Magic is real. I’ll even go out on a limb here and tell you that I do, I do, I do believe in fairies!” I clapped my hands for dramatic emphasis.

Dick laughed. “At least invest that enthusiasm in something worthwhile like Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny.”

“Well, to be honest, I’m a bigger fanboy for the Great Pumpkin, anyway.” I looked over the reams of notes we had spread on the table between us, perilously close to the dripping plate of nachos. “In seriousness, though, what’s the theory?”

“Tell you what, look at all the evidence we have here, and let’s see if you come to the same conclusion. And don’t dismiss the realm of fantasy in your analysis.”

“What is this, math class? All right, give me a second…”

I pondered the facts in front of me, but couldn’t really come up with anything remotely plausible beyond a werewolf or Pennywise the Dancing Clown. 

“Every two to four weeks, some poor sap turns up with their blood drained. Very little blood evidence. Potentially suicide, but who knows.” I rubbed at the back of my neck, ground my teeth. 

“Careful, Wally, I think I smell your hair cooking from here.”

I chewed my lower lip. 

“‘It wakes up every thirty years and it feeds…’ Dude. I got nothin’. Besides Damon Salvatore, anyway.”

Dick leaned back in his chair, looking wholly satisfied. “B-1, _bingo.”_

I stared at him. “Are you for real?”

“See, I _said_ I wasn’t ready to present my theory--now you know why.”

I couldn’t help myself. I burst out laughing.

“Screw you, dude,” he said, rolling his eyes, although he laughed, too. He adopted a stern expression. “ _In seriousness_ \--a vampire still doesn’t explain the snake and our mad love, so I haven’t settled on that angle.”

“Well, while we’re in Fantasy Land, what angle _are_ you settling on?” I asked. “Think it’s like… an incubus or a sukkubus or whatever those are called? I mean, those things seduce unlucky human morons, don’t they?” I thought of something. “Maybe we should call them lucky. Death by sex with smoking hot demon really doesn’t sound all that bad.”

“I can think of worse ways to die,” Dick agreed. “Anyway, I _did_ think about incubi as potential perps here, too.”

“Why would an incubus drain a person’s blood, though?”

“That I also don’t know. I think we might have to look into some of these locations and see if we can turn up more connections, maybe try talking to some people that knew the victims. I honestly wonder if they have a tie to Amusement Mile--I’d _really_ like to see if any of them went on the Phantom Theater and touched anything compromising, and whether that tied into these weird murders.” He paused. “Oh, man--on that note, we should also probably grow eyes in the back of our heads in case the next step in this whole equation is to get bushwhacked and drained by LeStat. ”

“Oh, shit.”

He made a face. “Yeah. I’m thinking there might be some seriously big ‘Drink Me’ signs on our backs at this point.” 

“Yikes.”

I thought on my dreams from the night before, but decided to wait on sharing them--last I checked, I didn’t have ESP. Still, it seemed noteworthy that I kept seeing some creepy, androgynous, milky-eyed Nosferatu in the vivid spate of nightmares. Might be something to bring up later, when more info was available to us. 

“Yep, jinkies, Fred.” Dick exhaled. “Anyway. I think we also might need to go back to Joker’s Funhouse and see if there’s anything we can turn up there.”

“Isn’t Zatanna looking into that side of things?”

“The magic side of things--we’d just be trying to find physical evidence that ties everything together.”

“You sure that’s a good idea?”

“Probably not, but I’m not sure the spell worked on us the way it was supposed to in the first place,” Dick said, his casual tones a little forced. I felt the color come up in my cheeks, and cleared my throat. “I just want to maybe sneak some of the security tapes--”

“Tapes?”

“Yeah, those cavemen still use tapes there.”

“Ha! Talk about living in the Dark Ages.”

“No kidding. It’d be _so_ much easier if I could just hack into their systems and find the security footage. But, them’s the breaks, I guess--God forbid anything be close to easy. Anyway, I’d like to you know, _borrow_ some tapes, go over them a bit, see if anything stands out. Talk to a couple of ride workers. Then we can see about chatting up some of the vics’ people.”

“All right. I can handle that,” I said, nomming a chip. “Fuel up, Mulder.”

*******

Later, we sat at the desktop computer in his garret bedroom, going over the piles of notes and slideshows of photos and clips of ripped video from the security feeds at Amusement Mile. The day had been arguably successful--we’d gotten some decent info from family members and friends of the victims, although nothing connective so far, and our raid on the Phantom Theater had gone off without a hitch (thank you, Speed Force, I forgive you for being an asshole back in ‘16.) Perusing the tapes, there had been a couple of images that had stuck out to us--namely that a handful of couples left the attraction in a big damn hurry, with the same ride worker sneaking out after them shortly thereafter, equally hasty. To our further surprise, these same couples, with more individuals added to them every so often, frequently showed back up to undergo the same pattern on the reg--like every few days or so. Curiosities piqued, we singled these images out, framed them as stills, and blew up the images, trying to get enough to make definitive IDs at some point. 

“Holy shit!” I hollered, pointing at the ride worker’s face--none other than the scary-good-looking, silver-eyed, wannabe metro Legolas. “I _saw_ him--I saw that dude right before we slurped the gherkin in that closet!” 

“What the hell!”

“Seriously--I saw--”

“No, no--where did you hear ‘ _slurp the gherkin’_ from?!”

“Oh, sorry, Artemis got me a slang dictionary for our anniversary last year and the first thing she wanted to look up was ‘blow job.’”

“Oh.” Dick snickered. “Nice. So wait, you _saw_ that guy?”

“Yeah, man. He mad-dogged the crap out of me as we were leaving the ride. I can’t believe I didn’t think of that until now.”

“It’s all right. There was a lot going on.” He jogged a note on a sheet of paper. “So-- _this_ is our dude… We’ll have a friendly--um, _chat_ with him when we return the tapes. We also might want to make good on our warning to the vics’ people that we might be back--I want to know if this guy was seen around before they died, since with the exception of Harry, none of them were at Amusement Mile prior to their deaths.”

His cell phone buzzed, and he checked it. 

“So--Zatanna just said she’s got an assload of info, but it needs followed up on, so she’ll be over tomorrow around 11:30, noonish.” He stretched his arms over his head. “In the meantime, I pretty much undid my shower from earlier and it’s too late to get anything of merit done before we meet with her, so I’m going to go rinse off and hit the sack.”

“Hit _the_ sack, _my_ sack, or _your_ sack?” I quipped. 

“Hopefully all three, just maybe not in that order,” he said, equally quippish. He rubbed his eyes. “Dude, it’s fuckin’ ten already?” He yawned. “I’m fried.”

“Yeah, me, too. On that note, umm… you going to be mad if I crash here another night?” I asked. “I’m uh… I’m not sure I feel like facing Artemis yet.”

“I don’t mind if you stay here, man, I kind of figured you were going to, anyway,” he said. He stood, and his voice gentled. “Have you heard from Artemis at all?”

I sighed. “A couple of texts here and there. You hear from Babs?”

“I’ve checked in with her a few times.” Again, he rubbed at his eyes. “God, it’s hard talking to her.”

“Yeah,” I muttered. “Yeah, tell me about it.”

An awkward silence stole over us, and I rubbed nervously at the back of my neck.

“Well,” he announced, “I’m going to go take a shower.” 

I nodded. “Mind if I grab one when you’re done?”

He shook his head, and stood for a moment, not looking in my direction. His dark hair, tousled and unruly, fell over his forehead. His shirt was fitted, his solid abdomen outlined beneath its thin material. I sighed, and tried _very_ hard not to dwell on the fact that he’d be _very_ out of those clothes and smelling _very_ good in short order… and only a few feet away.

I swear--I did try.

But…

“…You want to just join me?” he asked, a little sheepish, a lot adorable. 

Well… A for Effort. Sorry, Artemis. Sorry, Babs.

I leapt to my feet. “Fuck yes.”

*******

Before you ask, I _still_ tried to rein it in once we were in the shower. 

My efforts were, overall, an epic fail. (In some ways, anyway.)

But, to my credit (and maybe his), we didn’t really do a _whole_ lot in the shower--just kind of made out, felt each other up a bit, and _maybe_ emulated a soft core porno film with the shampoo--considering that I was _still_ trying to keep my dick to myself. Oh, my God _\--_ I mean my penis. My _penis_ to myself. (As I smack my head.)

However… It went downhill pretty fast, and I relay that with a properly contrite expression. He toweled off, and then wrapped the linen around his waist--goddammit--reached over to me, and surprised me when he kissed my cheek, before whispering, “Good night.”

Hell no, good night. I took his arm before he could leave, and said, “Will it be?”

He stared at me for a second through the steam, his hair wet and dripping, his skin still speckled with water, and then _bam--_ we were _really_ making out. Hot and heavy this time, all mingling tongues and heated nipping and breathless pants. It blurred into winding up in his bed, and although nothing especially scandalous happened right off, the kissing continued, and kept mounting, until I found myself underneath him, some of his weight on his elbows, the rest pressing me into the mattress. I shifted, and caught my breath when I found that I couldn’t move much. He held me under him, the powerful, bulging somas of his arms flush against my torso, my own lithe form overpowered under his mass. He might have been well-muscled, but _looked_ sleek and slender, given his narrow waist and long limbs; he was _way_ heavier than he looked. I knew it got under his skin, the sudden growth spurt that assailed him in his teens and shot him upwards like a weed and brought his adult bulk with it--it all made his gymnastics career and trapezist gigs a _lot_ tougher. On the field, though, I knew the added size had its benefits. It abruptly struck me that if I didn’t have my speed, even with my own extensive training, he could _easily_ flatten me. I’m fast, not strong. And as I lay beneath him, my breath penned beneath his unexpected weight, my motions restricted, I felt totally emasculated, all at once completely aware of just how _strong_ he was--and capable of breaking me.

To my shock, _I liked it--_ and with a newfound appreciation for habitual subs everywhere, wanted to take it further.

High off of the feeling that he _could_ lay me out with ease, and the knowledge that he _wouldn’t,_ I lifted my hips, pressing my pelvis to him, feeling his erection against my lower abdominals. I sucked at his tongue when it flickered past my lips, rolling over my palate, massaging the tender spot just behind my teeth. I grasped his buttocks, angling, wordlessly attempting communication to no avail. I made noises that I _hoped_ were sexy, drew his lower lip between my teeth, pushed my tongue against the roof of his mouth. Still no _real_ escalation.

I really didn’t have any good words to express what I wanted without sounding like a total _idiot--_ but he wasn’t reading my signals, either (or he was, and was pointedly ignoring them, and driving me _nuts_ in the process), so I just kind of dropped my dignity like it was hot and whispered in his ear.

“Dick,” I breathed. 

He paused, and gazed down at me, his hands on either side of my face, his lips full and gleaming, his eyes luminous, vibrantly _blue--_ that cerulean hue specific to the waters in Photoshopped Caribbean vacation ads _._ He legit looked like the cover of a tatty, well-loved, oft-masturbated-to bodice-ripper--maybe it was inevitable that the next (stupid) words came tumbling fucktardedly out of my mouth.

“…I want you inside me.”

Well, that happened. I inwardly cringed, imagining that I could just sort of reach out and catch the words before he heard them. I mean, I _could_ haul foot faster than the speed of sound at that point, surely keeping those words from falling on his ears was possible.

However I might have felt that getting eaten by a grizzly bear would be a less painful way to die than by the humiliation of those words, what happened next took me a bit by pleasant surprise. Granted, after laying my self-respect and esteem out to dry like that, I’m not really sure what I thought _would_ happen next, barring him fleeing butt naked through the window to go streaking in a blanched, shamefaced blur down the sidewalk, screaming in horror and secondhand embarrassment all the way until he got picked up for indecent exposure. 

Instead, he kissed me even _harder--_ a feat that hitherto seemed impossible--and then with a suddenness, his breathing furious and his entire body shivering, he paused. Seemingly with a tremendous amount of restraint, he pulled in a deep, prolonged breath.

“Have you ever…” His voice trailed off.

I shook my head, feeling suddenly embarrassed and virginal. “Pegged or anything? No.”

There was a long stretch of noiselessness.

“It’ll hurt,” he said finally, his lip quirking up a bit.

I felt a little less like playing in traffic, and half-smiled back. 

“You’re optimistic,” I said, regaining some of my composure. 

He chuckled a little. “It will, though, or at least it'll feel weird--it wouldn’t matter if I were hung like a grape.” 

“I don’t care,” I said. 

“… _I_ do.”

Again, I pressed my pelvis to his. “Well, I don’t.”

He gazed at me wordlessly for a moment, his features soft in the dim light from the bedside lamp, and then he said, “…Just let me try something first.”

I wasn’t sure what that “something” would be, but, trusting him, I nodded. 

Uh--so I’m _really_ glad that I did. That night marked my first full-body orgasm.

“Might be a little klutzy,” he warned me from where he knelt between my legs, “I’ve only been on the receiving end of this, so… I guess we’ll just have to hope that’s good enough to go on here.”

Already feeling a little nervous, hearing that didn’t exactly bolster my confidence. I faked it the best I could, even though I was sure he could hear my heart pistoning madly in my chest. “…Okay, then.”

I wasn’t sure what he was doing, and I watched curiously as he shoved the comforter and sheets to the base of the bed, where they’d be effectively out of the way, and unwrapped a condom. I leaned my head back, deciding not to keep tabs on what came next, by now fighting an even more serious inrush of nerves. I focused on the ceiling, and inhaled when I felt the shock of lubricant. 

I released that breath, forcing myself to stay calm and _not_ freak out, when I felt a soft, careful pulse _,_ followed by the feeling of retreat. I felt it again, and, the sensation entirely alien and curious, I felt my own muscles as they responded to it, drawing inward, tightening. I gritted my teeth, my brow lowering, my muscles stringing taut. 

“Relax,” he whispered. 

I did (or tried to--I guess I was successful enough), and gasped when his touch deepened. He stilled, and I closed my eyes, concentrating on my breathing-- _in, out, in, out--_ slowly growing accustomed to the feeling as I contracted around it. 

Then, the movement started, slow, tender, circling lightly, and again, I gasped. I started when I felt the damp pressure of his mouth close like a hot, satin cloth around my burgeoning erection, and, looking down in confusion, I saw that it was his _finger_ that he was working on me with _\--_

_\--Oh--_

\--his touch soft, probing, stroking upwards, sending ripples of absolutely _overwhelming_ feeling shuddering through my midsection, unfurling in breakers of effervescent heat through my entire torso. His touch grew a little firmer, pivoting, compressing. All the while, he gently sucked my cock. My head fell back into the pillow beneath me, my jaw going slack, all of the sensation--fucking _incredible--_ rolling in clement waves from my middle and outward. My abdomen clenched up, heating in a giant hurry.

And… Then it happened.

I felt it starting, of all places, in my toes, unwinding from deep within my core at the same time. It snowballed into teeming waves of soldering energy that undulated up and down my entire body, my vision diffusing in the overpoweringly radiant blur that overtook the white surface of the ceiling. My ears filled with cotton batting, thrumming with singing chimes, their reverberating bell tones harmonizing with the sounds of my own discordant moaning. Everything was lost on me as I lapsed beneath this stupefying onslaught, submissive to the awesome, legit _god-like_ power of every wave that poured through my form. One thing stood out in clear relief in spite of my brain going to gruel--for all that this was unmistakably the most overwhelming orgasm I’d ever experienced, there was no ejaculation, literally no semen. Much like his climax the day before. I might have thought that I didn’t need to be jealous after all, but I really didn’t have the presence of mind to process much beyond mental caveman noises or “I am Groot.” My breath stalled out completely, my limbs liquefying into the sheets and my skin quavering in response to each outward pulse of feeling.

“I--I’m… I'm coming…” I moaned in pathetic spurts, my body going flaccid and loose, wholly aflame in sensory overload.

I exhaled in a moment of surprise when he withdrew his finger, and for a bare moment more, tongued the head of my sex, his touch still tender. I sucked in a breath, held it, my chest lassoing, saltating beneath the strain, and let that air loose--and with my outbreath, oh, holy face of Christ on a tortilla--there it was--such an absolutely _massive_ ejaculation that I’d have knocked Artemis up with octuplets if I’d shot her full of a load like that. I had no words--I didn’t even have fucking _sounds--_ as I slammed to my back and just deliquesced there, the seisms still wavering unendingly through my jellied, sinking form, my mouth jawing mutely. I gasped and issued a groan that rolled up all the way from within the pit of my belly when I _felt_ the pressure as he swallowed, the motion maddeningly tugging my effete, softening shaft. I cannot _believe_ I remained corporeal--I don’t know how many times or how violently my molecules did their vibrating thing, but they did it enough that I felt somehow transparent, only half-there, spinning on the surface of the bed.

“What… the fuck… did you do to me…” I gasped out. My eyes were practically tumbling into the back of my head. 

Dick didn’t reply, just crawled over me after a moment--I _think_ he put a condom on and lubed up then, I didn’t know and I really didn’t have the frame of mind to give a shit--and closed his lips over mine, his damp and swollen, the kiss sodden. Oh, man--I could taste my own cum-- _that_ was new--and a tremor went through me as I sighed, weak beneath him, tasting myself still more as his tongue probed past my lips. 

“You still want me?” he said, looking thoroughly pleased with himself. 

“Umm... Uh-huh,” I slurred, still only maybe a third there. 

Smooth, Wally. Real smooth.

And then, he devoured my astonished cry when, with one slow, liquid motion given my spent, entirely uninhibited state, he slid inside me. 

I lifted my chest into him, my neck bowing, my numb, heavy arms barely hefting my weight. He was right--it hurt, that first penetration. Not terribly, but enough, and I could _feel_ my body reflexively resist his presence, constricting and attempting to withdraw inward. With a weak, grunting pant, I sagged back down, turning my face into the pillow. His hand passed softly over my hair, fingers tracing my cheek. I felt his lips softly feathering over my neck, my jaw, light upon my earlobe. He lay unmoving otherwise, allowing me some time to integrate him. I breathed, again just focusing on _in, out, in, out,_ all of my body gone numb with every last feeling funneling down into where he lay, long and thick and inflexible, inside me, concentrating there. 

Finally, I clasped his legs, wrapping mine around his hamstrings, and reached up to rest my hands on his shoulders, looped beneath his arms. I pressed my fingers into his flesh in a light squeeze, indicating that I was good (well, good-ish) to go. 

He rolled his hips, sliding slowly in and out, and I did the meditative breathing thing like Dinah taught me (in combat training. Not in this, obviously. But it applied here.) I craned my neck, feeling my larynx strain as my voice hummed in time with his rhythm, and I slid my hands down his back, grasping him now by the waist. I couldn’t decide if it hurt, or if it felt weird, or if it felt okay. Squirming a little, experimenting, attempting to find a spot that was comfortable, I drew my legs up, pulling him deeper inside me--and oh, _God,_ okay, _there. That._ It felt _so good_ when he went in deep like that _\--_ was _this_ what everyone made such a big deal over in Cosmo? This pleasant rush of sensation was so sudden and different from the pronounced discomfort from prior that I lost a loud huff of oxygen, the sound encouraging him to thrust a little more quickly. I pressed my face to his, with his facial hair chafing my cheek, now incapable of anything other than replete, moaning compliance. 

When he came, I felt it, every throb, every shudder, and I met his mouth, consuming the thrum of his voice. The stiff, trembling planks of his body unwound slowly, until he sank down atop me, his weight warm, secure, heady with the mixing scents of soap and shampoo and quite frankly, uh, _sex_.

“Holy shit,” I moaned into the soft, dim quiet of the bedroom. 

He lifted his head, and smiled at me. “Yeah. Holy shit.” 

We lay in silence for a while, my hands resting limply on the small of his back. I was extremely, extremely aware of him, still inside me. I turned my face into his neck, and just _breathed._

This was, undeniably, a First. And I felt it--that customary sense of needing to withdraw, go introspective, and just _process_ everything. That aside, there was a sense of fountaining, as though a faucet ran in my body, welling up in my chest, and trickling through all of my limbs, leaving a wash of tingling behind. My eyes burned and filled, and--motherfucker--I was fighting tears. Again. I had _no_ idea why--there was just the strange sense that something had been wound up inside me for so long that I had since ceased to take notice of it, dogging me, plaguing me in ways I’d grown deadened to, had finally, _finally_ started to uncoil. 

I held my breath, my eyes hot and founting, and just prayed he wouldn’t notice how full they had become. I blinked cautiously, in a way that held the tears _in,_ rather than allowing them to fall over my lower lashes. 

(Come on. No way was I crying a third time in one day.)

After a time, he slipped out of me, the feeling startling me a little. In his place, a cold, numb pressure took over, and I heaved a sigh, grateful that the Speed Force also kicked my healing reflexes into higher gear. Otherwise, I’d probably be wobbling around on weak spaghetti noodles (and likely suffering more embarrassing aftermath, aside) for the next day or two. He shifted to his back, and, overcome, and really not liking that sudden distance, I burrowed into his side, gratified when his arms wrapped around me, protective, capable. We rested like that, not speaking, but again, not needing to. 

“So, uh…” I murmured after a while, feeling ready to come back to Real Time, no longer wrestling with keeping the faucets turned off, although my eyes remained a bit damp. My voice was thin, hoarse, quavery. “What the heck was that you did?”

“That’s a… It’s a little trick I learned from Raquel.”

I turned to my side, and propped on my elbow, and then just lay flat when I almost tipped to my back, off-balance--I felt dead drunk. My limbs flopped and floated. “Do tell.”

“Well, you’ve heard of the male G-spot, I’m guessing,” he said, clearly amused.

“Yep, entrenched deep in the Forbidden Zone.”

He laughed. “Pretty much. What I essentially did was milk your prostate.”

I let out a breath. “It was… fucking _mind-altering._ ” I wiped the one tear that managed to squeeze its way from my eye--little asshole. I made a colossal effort to collect myself. “I don’t think I can go back to normal sex now--if my relationship with Artemis suffers after this, I’m blaming you, I hope you know that.”

He chuckled a bit, and leaned over to kiss me.

“You’re right about one thing, though--it _is_ mind-altering,” he said after a moment.

I whistled through my teeth, and shook my head. “So… you got that from Raquel?”

He nodded. “Yeah. I was… seventeen, I think? I mean, she and I were still together, and we’d, you know, _Done It_ a handful of times by then. Anyway, so this one night, we were just kind of fooling around, and she asked if I wanted a prostate massage. I honestly had no idea what that was, but I figured, well, everything else is feeling pretty great, so sure, why not? I had _no_ idea it meant sneaking up my back end, but once I kind of uh, got used to the idea…” He shook his head. “It was pretty fucking magical. Dude--I came for like _ten minutes._ And I blew enough at the end that I could have singlehandedly stocked an entire sperm bank until the end of time. Then I cried. A lot.” 

“I’m like, one second away from that, myself,” I confessed.

He reached over, and passed his thumb over my cheek. “Go for it, man. It’s just me.”

I shook my head. “What was it you said yesterday? That you need to salvage what’s left of your throttled dignity?”

He smiled. “Noted.”

I heaved a sigh, and squeezed my eyes shut.

“Welcome to the ranks of the multi-orgasmic, by the way,” he said. “That’s a real rarity among us dudes.”

I fiddled with the sheet. “Not about to forget _you’re_ the one who got me there.” Attempting to elevate the mood, I smiled over at him. “I repeat--you _sure_ you’ve never been with a guy?”

He grinned. “I’m sure. Rest assured, Wally--you’re my first. Besides, I might ask the same of you.”

“I don’t know, you’ve been handling yourself pretty comfortably over there…”

He laughed. “Eh, I think it’s more that we inherently know the equipment. It’s like having your driver’s license--might be a different car, but you still know how to drive.”

I settled into the pillows. I was _exhausted._ “Fair point.”

After a time, he turned to me, the set of his jaw a hundred percent serious.

“So,” he said. 

“So,” I mumbled, about half a second from passing the hell out.

“That just happened.”

“Yes, it did.” I stifled a yawn.

There was a heavy quiet.

“…Think it did by our own choice?”

I sighed, opening my eyes, again, fiddling with the sheet. “I don’t know. But…”

“But what.”

“But nothing, I guess,” I muttered with a sigh, really not up for dwelling on this ugly side of things. “Look. Zatanna will be here in the morning, right? With mad info?”

“Yeah.”

“Look. Let’s just… Ask that question then.”

He rose up on his elbows, and moved over me, his motions slow. I drew him down, and kissed him for… well, I don’t know how long. I might actually have been up for a second round, if he didn’t pull back when he did. I stared up at him, overwhelmed by so many tossing emotions that I felt completely stuck, wanting to articulate, but for once in my life, entirely unable to.

“Wally,” he said.

I waited.

He sighed, and then turned to his back, reclining next to me. 

“What,” I said, turning to my side, facing him.

“Get some sleep,” he murmured, and twisted to shut off the lamp. “We’ve got a lot on our plate tomorrow.”

I rolled my eyes in the darkness, and leaned into the pillows.

 _Okay, Batman,_ I thought with a sigh, quelling an odd sense of disappointment, and ignored my phone when it lit up on the nightstand.

  
  
  



	5. Act 5: The Apple

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, all!
> 
> First off... EVERYBODY WELCOME HARRY & CO!! :D 
> 
> Second off... I *think* Bob can come out in the daytime, and I *think* he can hang out in McAnally's. If I'm wrong... uh... crap. XD The Wiki wasn't very helpful, and I tragically lost all of my books prior to Changes when I moved some years back. If he can't be at McAnally's or out during the day... I humbly apologize, and beg that we treat this as though it's even more than AU than it already is. :D 
> 
> Third off... Yes, this story takes place post-Changes. <3 So there are *minor* spoilers involved if you haven't read the books, but intend to. I've attempted to be gentle with spoilers to that end and keep them as vague as possible. Trying to line up the timelines, I'm fairly sure this would have to come after the events of that book... so I just did my best. <3 <3 
> 
> Fourth off... This chapter is LONG. I am SO sorry. <3 There was a lot to cover here... 
> 
> And finally... I'll let you get to it!! Much love, all. <3 :D Enjoy!!
> 
> (PS: Thank you, Mangaluva, for "Bi Wonder.") :D 
> 
> Xoxoxoxoxoxo  
> ~EF <3

I woke up sometime before dawn. The sky outside was only just starting to turn a thick, grimy shade of blue. I frowned, rubbing my forehead. That milky-eyed face. I had seen it again.

I was tired upon waking, my head dizzy and whirling, my eyelids heavy and gritty, but I couldn’t relax enough to go back to sleep. No matter how I tried, I couldn’t halt my brain from wheeling in its restless circles, like a racing greyhound.

Dick slept beside me, peaceful, his breathing steady and quiet. I tuned into it, the sound of his even respiration soothing, somehow, an analgesic to my disturbance. The lights from the city outside illuminated the room enough that I could clearly make out his features, and I studied him, absorbing the sight of his profile with a sense of burden. Even with heightened healing, I could _feel_ a dull, achy sense of pressure in my backside--minor, not especially bothersome, and likely to be gone in an hour or two, but there, all the same. 

I still couldn’t believe what had happened--no more than I could the day prior. And worse, I couldn’t believe that it had _continued_ to happen, and now, here I was, in _way_ over my head.

Worse, I _still_ wasn’t sure what I was feeling, and the two people I trusted most in this world to confide in were the very people that I couldn’t talk to about it.

I pulled on the boxers and jeans I’d been wearing and pouring sweat in all weekend, took my phone from the nightstand, and headed to the balcony.

I stared out at the buildings that surrounded Dick’s loft, watching as the sky gradually lightened, shifting from an ugly, matte cadet to a muted stone color, dark, musty orange at the horizon point between skyscrapers. The air was already oppressively muggy, wrapping my skin in a warm, constricting blanket of sweat. Still, the city was comparatively quiet at this hour, dewy, biding. I sighed, headed back into the apartment to cool off, and decided to make some coffee. There was no way I was going back to sleep at this rate. 

I was glad to find that Dick didn’t just have whole beans on hand, as I feared, since I _really_ didn’t want him waking up if I were to run the coffee grinder. I opened a bag of ground coffee, prepped it, and then watched as the percolator did its job, spitting the dark, fragrant liquid into the decanter. Now I had to hope the smell didn’t wake him. Some people are like Pavlov’s Dog with that stuff--Dick and Tim being prime examples. 

I sat at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee and a box of cereal. I _had_ wanted to tear into the Zebra Cakes, but that seemed kind of unmannerly, considering that they were part of the bereavement gift the girls had put together for him. I dumped half the box of Lucky Charms into a bowl, crunched on them dry, and when I started feeling less like I was about to go facefirst through the tabletop, I finally checked the screen of my phone. 

Sure enough, the last text was from Artemis, last night. I felt my heart kick frantically, like it just decided to channel Michael Flatley in my chest.

 _Hey,_ it read. _Checking in. Haven’t heard from you guys much today. You okay?_

I sighed, and buried my face in my hand. I felt sick. 

I texted her. 

_Hey. You up?_

To my surprise, I got a reply not a minute later.

_Crazy as it sounds, yep. Effin work <3 How goes?_

I gritted my teeth, trying to figure out what I was going to say, and how I was going to say it. The better way of doing this would be, of course, to talk in person, but I didn’t really fancy having my teeth fly out the back of my neck, and equally, I liked my balls where they were. 

_Not so good,_ I sent.

I made it through maybe three quarters of the cereal before I got a reply.

 _Aw, babe. <3 What’s wrong? _she asked. 

_We’ll just need to talk when I get home,_ I sent.

_Everything okay?_

I felt my heart snare drumming in my chest, its speedster report so quick even for me that I was shocked I didn’t pass out.

 _Not really,_ I replied.

_What’s wrong?_

Well, I figured, might as well just level. 

_Listen. I’ll be honest. I cheated on you._

I dropped the phone on the table, and sure enough, it buzzed repeatedly shortly thereafter--she was calling. I ignored it.

When the buzzing died, I looked at the screen.

Three missed calls. Four texts. 

_Umm… what are you talking about_

_Wally, wtf--answer_

_YOU ARE FREAKING ME OUT RIGHT NOW PICK UP_

_Okay did Dick fucking know bc I’m calling his ass too_

I sent her a response before she could get to that:

_I’ll explain later, but yeah he knew--he was kinda the one I cheated with. Don’t say anything to Babs yet, okay?_

The longest silence I’ve ever endured followed that confession--even though it was barely a minute in length. I felt for the umpteenth time like crying, nauseated with guilt and self-loathing. 

When my phone buzzed again, I lifted it, slowly, as though it were a five-ton barbell. 

_Pffffttttt omg Wally that’s not funny you asshole XD XD_

Another buzz.

_Seriously, don’t do that crap ya jerk :P You actually had me going for a second XD Look, I need to head into work for an emergency meeting, but I’ll be back around 10:30 if you need me, k <3 Hug Dick for me <3_

Well. 

Fuck.

I decided not to pursue the conversation, and finished the coffee and cereal, feeling, again, like a heel for the amount of Dick’s food I’d polished off while I’d been there. Granted, I could always buy him more. And plus--I’d sucked his cock. That meant we were even… right? 

Sigh.

I laid my head on the table, lethargically watching the steam rise from the lip of my coffee mug. Dick also, technically speaking, now had at least _one_ facet of my virginity.

Thinking on it, it was an entirely different headspace--taking it versus giving it, if you catch my drift. It gave me a whole new appreciation for the double-sided significance of sex, for one thing, and that same glaring, newfound comprehension really, really, _really_ brought home just what it was that Dick and I had done, for another. I had become, in the course of less than an hour, arguably _far_ more intimate with him than with Artemis. I worried at my lower lip with my teeth, afire with the memory of him, that first moment I felt him deep within me, that sensation of _total, perfect union_ , all of the sensories it woke up, physical and intangible. Even knowing, now, that we suffered some sort of weird, supernatural mojo that coerced us into whatever the heck this was--somehow without it actually seeming forcible--I wasn’t any more sure that I could face my life without this new slant on our existing bond than I had been two nights prior. 

What did it all mean.

I sighed, and sat up, finishing the coffee. Abruptly, holy crap--I was _tired_. Much like alcohol, caffeine doesn’t do much for me, unless I drink it in exceptionally copious amounts, and the shitty night’s sleep on top of the early morning decided to equalize me all at once--’bye, Felicia. I ground the heels of my hands into my eyes, and then, figuring screw it, I headed back up to rejoin Dick in bed. I chucked the jeans, and sliding in between the sheets, I turned to my side at his back, lying convex to concave, mindful not to disturb him, and rested my face just at the nape of his neck. 

Five seconds later, a knock fell on the door. My face was tacked to the sheet underneath me, stuck there in a glue of sweat and drool. I shot upwards, swiping at my face. 

Dick, for his part, reached over, and shifted the alarm clock.

“Oh, shit, it’s noon,” he hissed. Meaning, Zatanna was there. Dick leapt from the bed, nabbed a pair of jeans and a shirt with one hand, swept the condoms and wrappers from the floor into the trash bin by the nightstand with the other, and then raced downstairs, pulling his clothes on as he went. 

As for me, I pulled on my own jeans and tee-shirt at a more leisurely pace. There wouldn’t be any secrets kept from Zatanna, anyway--the apartment smelled like a damn brothel. All mixing scents of cologne and body heat and, uh, other things. Plus, I was still kind of reeling from the night before, and I’m not the most subtle person in the world.

Dick let her in, and she placed a bulging bag of donuts and carrier of coffee on the island. 

“You,” I announced, tearing unhesitating into the bag, “are a doll.”

She grinned. “Figured you could use the fuel. How’s it been going?”

“It’s… definitely been going,” Dick said with a chuckle, accepting the coffee I handed him. “How’d it go on your end?”

“Well, we have a meeting in an hour in Chicago,” she said. “With one of my contacts and a couple of his affiliates.”

“Who’s the contact, do we know him?” Dick asked. 

Zatanna shook her head. “No, you wouldn’t have met him--he’s strictly on the magic side of things. Generally, this arena of magicians… They don’t really like to be out in the open, and they aren’t even known to the Justice League. I don’t even think Batman knows about these guys.”

“Big talk,” Dick said, leaning on the counter, sifting through the donuts. “Tell me more.”

“This side of the mystic world… It’s _very_ serious. And _highly_ secretive. I mean--you know that at this point, Dick.”

He nodded, and smiled. “Just yanking your chain.”

She smiled back. “Now, that being said, I really doubt Harry would care if the JLA was aware of him, but he _is_ a member of the White Council, and they’re the cagey ones. So… He’s got to at least _pretend_ to play by their rules here and there.” She paused. “Not that he cares. Ever.”

“So who is he?” I asked, by now piqued. “Harry? Obviously not the Harry that Dick and I have been focusing on.”

“No,” Zatanna said. “ _This_ Harry is Harry Dresden. I don’t know if you’ve heard of Chicago’s wizard-for-hire, but… that’s him. He’s got other jobs on his plate, including an especially big, uber-special ops one, but that’s his main marketing point.” 

“How do _you_ know him?” I asked, genuinely curious. “I mean, I don’t want to assume that every wizard on the planet knows each other just by virtue of being wizards.”

“He… helped me avoid getting in the shit with some _scary_ big wizards,” she said, inclining her head. “It was, uh… Not long after what happened to my dad with the Helmet. I dabbled in some sorcery that _might_ have been a little sketchy.” 

Dick straightened. “Wait--is _this_ the guy? The one you told me about back when?”

Zatanna smiled. “Yeah, this is the guy. _The_ hero. The one whose name I wouldn’t mention.” 

“You mean I get to say thanks in person?”

She nodded. “Yep. He’s a pretty big fan of yours, you know--he’ll totally squeak like a girl when you actually speak to him.”

“Dude. What happened?” I asked, almost choking on my donut in my extreme interest.

“Well…” She made a face. “I was… in a bad place, Wally. Like… _really_ bad. I guess it could have been worse… I mean, it’s not like I _sought_ dark magic to achieve what I wanted. More… I was vulnerable, and gullible, and wasn’t really checking my sources like I should have when certain, um… _cures_ came to my attention. There was more going on behind the scenes--kind of a magic mafia thing that I fell _right_ into. I was prepping some spells that…” She trailed off, and shook her head. “I could have gotten in some _serious_ trouble. Like… Executed trouble.”

I stared at her. “I’m sorry, what? Executed? What was it, the French Revolution?”

She grimaced. “You never put a toe out of line with your sorcery, Wally, because if you do, you’d better be ready to conjure up a pair of eyes in the back of your head. I mean that literally. Because the White Council, who basically are the semi-secret governing body of magic-users, they _will_ come for you. There’s no if on that. Just a when. You _don’t_ go afoul of them or break the Laws of Magic. And a lot of these sorcerers on the Council? _Way_ out of my league. I’m not even sure I’d feel safe standing by Superman if one of their Wardens or the Gatekeeper came for me.”

“You’re kidding, right?” I stared at her, forgetting momentarily to chew my eclair.

She shook her head, her face stone cold sober. 

“…Damn.”

“Yeah. They’re the _real_ deal, Wally. They’re like the boogeymen that wizard moms tell their kids to watch out for--like ‘eat all your vegetables or the White Council will get you.’”

“Umm… So can I ask the obvious question?” I asked. 

“Shoot,” said Dick, grinning, “we kind of expected nothing less, anyway.”

“Nyuk-nyuk-nyuk,” I said, lobbing an errant blob of eclair at him. 

He laughed. “Dude--quit food-bombing me.” He chucked the lid to his coffee cup in my direction. I deflected it--no speed, on my honor as a hero… okay, _maybe_ a little speed--and sent it sailing back at him. 

Zatanna lifted her eyebrows, a wry set to her lips. “Well, I take it you guys don’t feel any differently yet.”

Dick rapidly deflated (in more ways than one--oh, I’m so clever I amaze myself.) “Oh, God, it’s not _that_ obvious, is it?”

She made a face. “Dick, you guys are seriously _mooning_ over each other so hard right now I feel like I walked in on the set of an all-male reimagining of _Blue Is the Warmest Color.”_

“Oh, come on.”

“For real, Dick. Like… _worse_ than M’gann and La’gaan when they were together.”

“Shut up…” I said, my jaw falling along with my stomach. “Because I threw a donut at him?”

She shook her head, a line appearing between her eyebrows. “It’s just how you guys are _looking_ at each other. You don’t even have to be _saying_ anything, you guys just like, _stare_ with the Puss in Boots look.”

“Z, you hold your tongue,” said Dick, looking scandalized. 

“Dick, I’m sorry. But…” Her expression--a frown? I thought?--deepened, and then, finally, she fell into a hysterical fit of giggles, that rapidly exploded into full-blown laughter. “If this wasn’t such a… such an _astronomically_ confused situation, I’d probably think you guys were the cutest pair of adorable little gay boys ever.” 

Dick just eyed her dubiously, as I unhappily chomped another donut. My cheeks probably matched my hair. 

Zatanna wiped her eye, and pulled it together. Turning to me, she said, “Sorry, so what was your obvious question?”

“If these White Council guys are such serious business,” I said, glowering at her, totally salty, “why are so many whacko magicians like Faust and Klarion not going the immediate way of the Bastille?”

“Oh. They’re really only alive by the grace of the Light,” Zatanna explained. “They’re under some pretty strenuous protection with Savage in their corner--who, by the way, is aware of the Council’s existence and frankly, totally doesn’t care either way--and at this point, the White Council is pretty stretched--like they have a lot more going on on their end than they can deal with as it is, and they just really don’t need to be bothering with nuisances like Wotan or Faust if the JLA can handle them. If they get far enough out of line, they’ll obviously come deal with them, but will try to do it in a way that is _super_ hush-hush and lightning fast.” 

“How are they stretched?” Dick asked. “I mean--what are they dealing with? Is it something the League or team should be aware of?”

“That part of things is so secret that _I_ don’t even have a single clue,” she replied. “Either way, that’s not the battle we need to worry about, here. What we _do_ need to worry about is the sorcery I found in the Phantom Theater, and what it all ties into--regarding the Council and a couple of other major players that might come as a bit of a surprise.”

“Pffffttt--Z, I plowed my best male friend the other night. I’m straight. I don’t think I’m ever going to be shocked again.”

“Wally,” Dick hissed, staring saucer-eyed at me.

“Dude, she already knows. Might as well just be upfront about the whole thing.”

Zatanna drew in a breath, and then said, “I’m not even going to ask what you guys are going to tell Artemis and Babs…” 

“Oh, God, Zatanna, _please_ don’t say anything,” Dick pleaded. 

“Oh, Dick, I won’t,” she said. “It’s not my place to say anything, anyway. I mean… If this had been ongoing for a long time, and you guys were just, like… stringing the girls along, I might speak up, but you guys are my friends, too, and I don’t want to do anything that will make a complicated situation worse. Or--well, _more_ complicated, I mean.”

“Okay. Thanks, Z,” he said, and brushed his hair out of his eyes. “I’d just… I’d _really_ like to talk to her myself.”

“Dick, I completely get it,” she replied. “Like I said. Mum’s the word. You don’t need to worry here, okay? I _did_ mention this to Harry, and my guess is he’ll have some decent answers for us, this is more his wheelhouse than mine. Depending on what those answers are… I really don’t see why they’ll have to know at all.”

I wrestled with a rampage of mixing emotions, all of them tossing and mingling, forming a colorless, murky sludge. Part of me wanted to shed this entire weekend like a stiff, crackling snakeskin and never speak of it again, but the overwhelming larger remainder of my aggregate parts rioted loudly against that very idea. The urge to grab Dick and just yank him to me as though I were a kid with a prized stuffed animal accosted me all at once. I sighed through my nose, scattering cruller crumbs all over. 

“Well, kids,” Zatanna announced, “this convo has been sufficiently awkward--and now it’s time to head to Chicago.” 

“Hell yeah,” Dick said, swiping his coffee from the counter. “Are we okay to go in civvies, or should we suit up?”

“Dick, I hate to tell you this, but he already knows who both of you are. Bit of a story as to how--but it does come back to that whole mess I was in back when. But believe me, you could trust Harry--and his associates--with more than your life,” Zatanna said. “I’ll just leave it at that. Don’t worry about your identities. They are _more_ than safe with him.”

Dick looked less than reassured, and put his sunglasses on. I was now _madly_ curious about this Harry character. I rose, and followed them both out of the apartment to head to the Zeta tube. 

*******

We wound up in a place called McAnally’s Pub, which, by my factoring, was obsessed with the number thirteen. I normally wouldn’t notice, but for the fact that Dick was clearly looking around, counting. That guy and his numbers. 

Thirteen wooden pillars, all with intricate relief carvings of what I thought might be depictions of fairy tales, thirteen scattered tables, thirteen stools around a crooked bar, thirteen ceiling fans whirring overhead. Later, I learned from Zatanna that the design of the place was made to diffuse external mystical energies. The steps down into the main area revealed the unusual room, colored in deep, earthy browns and sea greens. The barkeep was a tall, gawkish guy with a shaved pate and staid demeanor. Some patrons sat at the bar, some at the tables. It wasn’t overly crowded. Zatanna’s face lit up when the long form of a man, bedecked in a canvas duster despite the tropical heat over a black tee-shirt with white lettering, lifted a hand. A smile spread over his hawk-nosed face, warming his brown eyes. He wore a pentacle necklace that hung over the collar of his shirt. I followed Zatanna over to the table where he sat with three other people, Dick trailing behind me. 

“Hey, Z,” he said, rising to give her a quick hug and back pat before she sat down across from him. “It’s been forever--I feel like your crotchety old grandpa, you never call! How’s it going?”

“It’s going,” she said happily. “Better for me than for these two, anyway.”

“Oh, yeah, the unlucky collateral damage,” the man chuckled. “What’s up, guys? Other than the obvious, I mean.”

“This adorable nerd,” Zatanna said, grinning broadly, “is Harry.”

I raised a hand, noticing that his shirt read “Come to the Dork Side: We Have Lembas.” He really wasn’t what I expected--maybe a tad older, but definitely not old, early forties, maybe, kind of dorky, with a very nice, if awkward demeanor, in that he seemed really intimidated to meet my eyes even for a flicker of a second. Not the living replica of Albus Dumbledore I was expecting. I felt a little more comfortable, and smiled. “I’m Wally. That’s Dick.”

“Yep, Zatanna’s told me a lot about you--and before you ask, _yes,_ that means you should be afraid,” Harry said, and then gestured to his companions. “This, here, is Karrin--you can just call her Murphy, or Murph. She heads up the Chicago Alliance, which keeps the city free of unwanted supernatural beasties, and fun fact, it’s probably a good idea not to get on her bad side.”

“Oh, please, this one will never get on my bad side--he’s so cute I just want to pinch his little ginger cheek,” Murph cracked, shaking my hand. She was… a mini-human. Blonde hair, blue eyes, adorable nose. But there was a strength in her grip, an acerbic quality to that one gibe, a strong, confident set to her stance, and such a power to her short build that indicated she might be able to go toe to toe with Black Canary if the occasion arose. She turned to Dick. “Same with this one--how do you manage to look like a vampire _and_ an ad for men’s cologne at the same time?”

Dick made a face, somewhere between flattered, annoyed, and confused. “Okay, I think I can handle men’s cologne ad, but what do you _mean_ , I look like a vampire? _Please_ tell me it’s not that I look pasty and dead.” He paused, and in a rare show of trust in a situation like this, took his sunglasses off. “Although I’d buy it--I _am_ in network security in my civilian life, or as the outside world knows it, the stomping grounds for basement dwellers everywhere.”

“Well, Harry knows all about basement dwellers, since he’s kind of one himself. On your end, it’s the dark hair and pretty features--plus, you kind of look like Damon from that CW show,” Murph explained good-naturedly. 

“Oh,” Dick said, and rubbed at his stubble. “Dude, I’m just going to grow a full-on beard, then. Maybe get a few visible piercings.” He turned to me. “What do you think?”

“I think Jason will call--he’ll want his look back,” I said. “Just _own_ your prettiness, dude.”

“Uh, I’m more disturbed that Murph over there even knows what that show is,” Harry said. “I’m going to have to seriously reevaluate my thoughts on her, now…” Murphy scowled at him. “Anyway,” he continued, “I’m with ginger Quicksilver here. You see these guys? Be like these guys-- _rock_ those girly features. And speaking of that, and men’s cologne ads, that forgotten Greek god of body cologne there is Thomas.” 

Next to Harry, a man of indeterminate age lifted a hand in greeting. He was young, I thought, but there was a strange, otherworldly, _knowing_ quality to his dangerously handsome features (Artemis, I determined, was _never_ allowed to meet him) that suggested he was older. A smile that made my supposedly straight knees go to water spread across his gorgeous face. I practically had to sit on my hands not to clap them over Dick’s eyes. 

I know. I’ll appreciate you not judging me, though. It was new territory, feeling jealous where Dick was concerned, and I frankly sucked balls at it.

Not literal ones.

Or literal ones.

Okay, I’ll stop.

“We’ll get into that walking cover of _Shoujou Beat’s_ backstory later,” said Harry, “because it’s insanely relevant to you guys right about now, but this other stupid-handsome fellow is… Uh… Well, we’ll just call him T. Is that okay with you? I promise not to make any T-bagging jokes. Well, not many.”

“Holy shit!” I exploded, not thinking, recognizing “T” immediately. “That’s the ride worker!”

“Say that a little louder Wally, I don’t think the barkeep heard you,” Dick said, and turned to him. “Sorry.”

“You really needn’t worry about using code names with this lot,” said Ride Worker/T in a soft, mellow lilt, addressing Harry. “If I’m not mistaken, they’re understanding of the need for secret identities, and I believe by their arrival in civilian clothing that we can all operate in trust here.”

“Huh--how unusually unsuspecting of you,” said Harry. “Last I checked, you’re a pretty stalwart, lips-zipped type. Real Angel of Death. That’s Tariq, a Hunter for House Raith.”

“A what for what-what?” I asked. I extended my hand to Tariq, awkwardly retracting it when he gave me a look that I’m _still_ astonished didn’t incinerate me on the spot like he hid a disintegration ray in his eyes--less silver than I remembered, now a middling, gunmetal shade. Uh, what was that about operating in trust? He shifted a lock of his edgy, curling mohawk--black, iridescent like a grackle’s wing, with dyed blue and silver tips--off of his alabaster forehead. The hair somehow failed to match his impeccable suit, one that might have even made some of Bruce’s look frumpy by comparison.

“Totally left me hanging, dude…” I mumbled in an effort to dispel the sudden tension, and sat in my chair, noticing that Dick didn’t even make an effort to shake the guy’s hand. My stomach loudly rumbled.

“We’ll get into that shortly,” said Harry. “First things first--why don’t you guys go ahead and order something before we get started? Mac’s steak sandwiches are so damn good you’ll probably start making a weekly pilgrimage to the Windy City just to get one from here on, and he’s got stouts so amazeballs I’m pretty sure leprechauns have named their kids after them.”

I decided I was going to like Harry. That didn’t take long. 

We went with the recommended beers, as well as these supposedly travel-worthy steak sandwiches. (Turns out--they were. I took a bite and a sip and my dick practically went hard.) 

“So,” Harry said, dispelling the easygoing conversation after we all finished up eating, placing his empty beer on the table. “Business time.” He reached inside his coat, and placed an undetermined object covered in a black sheet in the center of the table. “There’s a _lot_ of info to go over--like, four years worth of Neil Degrasse Tyson lectures as told by Ben Stein--so I’ve enlisted my assistant-slash-secretary to give us a hand in the exposition.” 

I stared at the round, smooth shape, hidden by the sheet, and wondered what the hell was under there. It looked intimidatingly like a severed head. 

“Assistant-slash-secretary?” Dick said, and then spoke my exact thoughts, breaking into a Mike Myers impression: “If it’s a severed head, I’m going to be very upset.”

“Hate to have to tell you this, Wayne, but… You’re going to be maybe a little upset,” Harry said, and then uncovered what was revealed to be a skull. 

I felt unsettled, to an extent, gazing at it, with the knowledge that this clearly wasn’t just some plastic model--this was clearly _real._ I wondered briefly who it belonged to, and tried not to think of magic like Klarion’s. 

I started when two orange, flickering lights appeared in the eye sockets, and the sound of an exaggerated yawn broke out in the middle of the table. 

“Genghis Khan pogo sticking on a goddamn one-legged sheep in a clown costume, Harry,” came a disembodied voice, that sent my jaw to the tabletop. “Catherine the Great milking a thirty-six-inch horse dildo! You wake me up at this ungodly hour, you’d better have a signed copy of _120 Days of Sodom_ to show for it.”

“Could have sworn I saw that on your bookshelves, Bob, complete with a nice, kinky autograph,” Harry said. “Also--who are you, and what have you done with Bob? Marquis De Sade is pretty freaking high brow for the Bob I know. I’ve _seen_ the ‘novels’ you read--what happened to being a total fanboy for lonely, middle-aged housewife fantasy?”

“I occasionally like to stress my infinite brain and get my high-hat kink on, unlike certain lazy, bonerless schoolboys I know,” Bob said. “Speaking of that, Harry, when’s the last time you exercised that flaccid tube sock you call a dick? That gorgeous little cupcake across the table would be a damn fine Bowflex machine for your woefully idle genitalia.”

“First off, Bob, that’s Zatanna Zatara--I’d be careful calling her a cupcake. Second off, she’s close to half a century younger than I am, and her father _happens_ to don the Helmet of Fate. In other words--I so much as carry her books for her, I’ll get these idle genitalia magic machine-gunned into scrotal confetti by none other than Don Corleone with Gandalf’s staff.”

“She’s not even _close_ to being that much younger than you, Captain Button Down Boy,” said Bob. “Still, if she takes her top off, maybe I’ll be nice and tell you everything you want to know.”

“Keep dreaming, Bob,” said Zatanna. “In case you didn’t gather, I’m Catholic.”

“Meaning years of repressed sexuality! You _know_ you want to,” said Bob. “And maybe get it on with our beloved cute little blonde across the table, while we guys watch--”

“Okay, Bob, you’d better shut your mouth or Thomas is going to fuck it,” said Murphy.

“What the hell, Murph, why do _I_ have to be the one to fuck it?!” Thomas protested. 

“Because Bob _obviously_ doesn’t bat for the boys’ side, so it’s the most effective idle threat.”

“Perhaps,” said Tariq with a ringing authority in spite of his soft, mild voice, “we should attend to the business at hand.”

“I’m with Tariq,” Dick said. “No offense, Thomas, I mean, you’re the second dude to make me question my sexuality and everything, but that’s not something I actually want to see.”

“Contrary to what you might believe,” Harry chimed in, “Bob is actually pretty fetching when you see him inside that skull. Very James Dean. Moving on, though, there’s a ton of info to go over here, and frankly, time grows short. So, yes, I’m also with Tariq--let’s make like the Ghost of Christmas Present in July and chat.”

“Thank you,” said Tariq. “I have a target to neutralize, and unending jests about sexual hypotheticals are narrowing my window of opportunity to remove that target in the time window I’ve been given.”

“Sorry,” said Harry. “As you can see, Bob is kind of on his own page. Which is usually the page of a trashy romance novel or _Star_. Anyway, though, he’s at least a handy repository of endless and oftentimes mindblowing info. Z, you and I talked yesterday, and my affiliates here at the table are also well aware of what’s going on. These guys here, though,” he indicated Dick and me, “aren’t. So I’d like to outline what we’re dealing with real quick, to clue them in.”

“Yes, for the love of God, do,” I said. “Because I’m confused about freaking _everything_ at this point. Literally everything. Myself included.”

“Okay. What you need to understand first, Wally,” said Harry, “is that we’re dealing with a force that is _centuries_ old. Centuries old, centuries evil. It’s pretty dang rare you deal with something quite this nasty on a day-to-day basis, even in your line of work. Or heck, even in mine. The villain in this equation is a Mavra, a vampire of the Black Court.”

Dick slammed the table. “ _I knew it._ Hashtag, Team Sidekicks. Suck it, Bats.”

“Dude! Major kudos to us! We actually thought about vampires when we were deliberating over this case,” I added.

“Damn--that’s some good work, guys,” said Murphy. “Crispy crackers here, Harry. I know the evidence you had available to you--that you were able to finger vampires?” She shook her head. “Really. Not bad. I’ll buy who your mentor was for a dollar and might even say you’d have one-upped him on this one.”

Dick actually _beamed._ I did, too.

“So… What do you mean by Black Court?” I asked, turning to Harry. 

“There are--well, _were--_ three courts of vampires. Black, which are the traditionally understood Dracula guys that can’t deal with sunlight or Italian food and shit themselves at the sight of a token of faith. These guys are kind of in a shambles, though, thanks to Bram Stoker. The Red… Well, we don’t really need to worry about them right now, they’re kind of…” he cleared his throat, “a thing of the past.”

A shadow had come over his sharp features, and I opted not to probe, in spite of my curiosity. 

“Then, we have the White Court,” Harry continued. “These sexy devils are _very_ much like incubi--meaning that rather than suck your blood or drink your soul or eat your flesh, they feed off of certain emotions or energies. Lust, fear, so on. Those handsome gents seated across from you are, in fact, members of the White Court.”

“So… you guys are like… incu-pires?” asked Dick, frowning at Thomas. 

“Sort of,” said Thomas. “The appetites that Tariq and I both entertain and suffer respectively are of the lustful variety.”

“So if you’re not sensitive to daylight… do you sparkle in the sun?” Dick asked. 

I snorted.

“No,” said Thomas firmly, although a smile worked at his lips, “we do not sparkle. And you’re lucky I can’t touch you after that remark.”

Dick inclined his head, but before that thread could continue, Zatanna spoke.

“So did _you_ put the spell on that rubber snake--and the other enchanted items I found while scoping out the ride--to feed off of the lust these things would generate?” she asked Tariq. 

“I commissioned the spell,” he explained. “My target, Mavra, is in partnership with a very powerful being that I likely will have to confront alongside her. This creature is powerful enough that, if I faced him alongside Mavra on my own, I would stand no chance if I didn’t feed amply beforehand.”

“Think of it like a boxer ’roiding out before a big fight,” said Harry. “The more Tariq over there feeds, the more powerful he becomes. The only drawback is that the more he feeds, the more of a slave to his Hunger he becomes, too--kind of like if steroids had a baby with crystal meth that grew up to be a totally psychotic--and insanely sexy--monster.”

“I see. So what’s going on with this… Mavra person?” I asked, noticing that Tariq looked fit to tear Harry a new one at any second. “And who’s the guy she’s working with that has Tariq crapping his drawers?”

“Mavra and I have a pretty tense history,” Harry said. “Right now, it’s neither here nor there--we can get into it later. Way later. At this moment, she’s after me. But she’s fallen on some hard times, apparently--she had a pretty rough run-in a while back with a colleague of mine acting on my behalf that folded her five ways and left her to roast in the baking hot sun. Even though she’s a little tougher than her younger vampire peers and won’t go up in ash like Claudia if she decides to work on her tan, prolonged exposure is going to hurt. And from what I hear, the poor hag suffered some permanent, crippling injuries from that whole ordeal, which went beyond just the obvious of having been left to fry. She’s not about to come after my colleague, since he’s in retirement and under _heavy_ protection in his off-time, but I guess she’s still got a yen to settle the score with yours truly. Now, in her current state, although she continues to pack a pretty solid magical right hook that could knock my nose right out the back of my skull with relative ease, she’s still in a bad position to come challenge me. She needs a new body. And she’s partnered up with a sorcerer I _know_ you guys are familiar with to get one--Klarion.”

“Oh, crap,” I said.

“Seconded,” said Dick. “So how is this _Mavra_ going about getting a new body, and how is Klarion coming into play?” 

“The method she’s going by isn’t quite like the soul-jumping necromancy we’ve personally seen in the past,” Bob said, “wherein someone’s consciousness occupies another’s dead body, thereby rendering it alive. This creepy old bag is going in an entirely different direction. She wants to _create_ a body for herself. One she can tailor to her specifications. Meaning… Blood magic.”

“Which is…”

“It’s dark, and it’s ugly,” Zatanna said. “It’s also _highly_ illegal for obvious reasons.”

“Hence,” said Harry, “I’m here. Beyond Mavra being totally hot for me.”

“How does it work?” I asked. “Blood magic, I mean.”

“She requires blood from certain types of people,” Harry said. “Hence… all those supposed suicides in Gotham. That’s how Mavra is covering herself--by making those poor folks she’s drained look like do-it-yourself jobs, as she cherry picks people who fit her specifications.”

“She killed one of my really close friends,” Dick said. 

Harry nodded. When he spoke, his voice was warm--giving away a softer side to his personality that I hadn’t yet seen. “So this is personal for you now, beyond what a massive upheaval getting caught in this crossfire has been for you. _Both_ of you.” 

“What kinds of people does she need?” I asked, not ready to go there yet. 

“Well, it all depends on the kind of body she wants,” Bob explained. “And I’m not talking about a new body like _Baywatch_ or the porn industry. There are certain energies in certain people. The kicker here--and it’s a _big_ one kids, like, gird your loins--is that she’s _clearly_ working her way up to meta-humans. This ugly old witch has already got a pretty hefty repertoire of superhuman abilities--magic, vampirism, which in and of itself boasts its own style of badassery, and so on--but think about if she were able to amalgamate those capabilities with those of someone like Superman or that smoking-hot Glamazon.”

“I repeat. Shit,” said Dick. “And I ask again, where does Klarion come into all this?”

“He has a specific, one-of-a-kind gem that can provide a conduit between bodies. I understand from the glowing beauty seated across from me that you’ve seen Klarion’s gem that created a rift and link to different planes of existence. This jewel is very similar--only it works strictly in the physical sense. Once the desired body is crafted, kind of like a golem, Mavra will need to transition wholly into it, and that’s a journey that’s pretty easy to get lost on. The jewel will act like a connection between her new body and her consciousness--providing clear passage and a stepping stone between bodies. Once the transition is complete, Klarion will diffuse whatever energy remains in the stone, thereby completing the transferral,” said Bob.

“Great,” I said, shaking my head. “I, uh… You know, I’m just going to come out and level with you guys. I didn’t mention it prior because it didn’t _quite_ seem relevant. But… it does now.” I cleared my throat, and rubbed at my neck. “I’ve had a handful of nightmares about this… really gross-looking hag. Like… Kind of how I might picture this Mavra character. Greasy black hair, bluish lips, cataracts, so on.”

“Have you, now,” said Thomas, gazing at me, his blue eyes ruminative, steadily holding mine. 

“Yeah. Like… repeatedly. Since Thursday.”

“Bob, you care to weigh in?” said Harry.

“Well, you might want to invest in a crucifix, if that’s your thing,” said Bob, “and eat a _whole_ lot of Chinese noodles. From what I understand of Mavra and her abilities, as well as the fact that you’ve had glimpses through space and time, having gotten lost in the Speed Force, or so I’ve heard, the fact that you’re dreaming of our very unsexy guest star of _Bordello of Blood…?_ That tells me that Mavra’s marked you for her next exsanguination target.”

My heart and gut slammed into the floor and palpated there.

“Oh, fuck,” I said. 

Dick edged a hair closer to me. 

“Well. I’m guessing that she, uh… she’s officially getting ready to assume her final form,” Thomas said. “She’s moving on from vanillas to metas that have traits she desires.” 

I miserably ate a stray fry.

“What do _I_ have that a vampire doesn’t, though?” I asked. “Speed, longevity… Don’t they already have that?” 

“Well, exactly that, I think,” said Harry. “All that they have. Only think of those traits without the incumbent vampire weaknesses, like sensitivity to sunlight.”

I stuffed another fry in my mouth.

“Why is she concentrating in Gotham?” Dick asked. 

“She may be after some of the metas locked away in Arkham,” Murphy said. “I understand you have some looney bin powerhouses that larger society would like to forget holed up in there.”

Dick nodded. “Yeah, that’s true.”

“Okay, let’s not think about that for a minute,” I said, agitated, my stomach rebelling against the fries. “What is Klarion going to get from all this?”

“If I had to guess,” said Zatanna, “access to a Scourge. Which is basically a group of Black Court vampires. Klarion is no stranger to mind control--and if he were able to influence a bunch of these vampires, along with the Renfields and thralls and the like that come with them, oh, Holy Mary, Mother of God. We’d have a _real_ crisis on our hands, one that would probably have us reaching out to the White Council--and generally, the White Council _really_ doesn’t like outsiders squatting in their sandbox.”

“Again,” I muttered. “Fuck.”

“In other words, we need to stomp this,” said Dick. “Like, _now.”_

“Indeed we do,” Tariq suddenly spoke. “That is why I have been in Gotham. That is why I was a glutton with my Hunger. That is why I have accepted that I cannot do this on my own. It’s _necessary_ if I’m going to remove the biggest threat that the White Court and mankind at large have seen collectively in some time.”

“Why a threat to the White Court?” asked Zatanna.

“Well, it’s arguable that House Raith has been rather powerful in influence in the Court for a long time. As you can guess, with most things, there’s a bit of a… _Sopranos_ thing going on behind the scenes. If one of the Houses of the Court has promised to restore the Black Court in order to secure an alliance to propagate a hostile takeover in the future… That threatens the White Court. The Black Court has been in the shit for so long they’re itching to make a _real_ comeback--and what better way than by ingratiating yourselves, entering in, and then taking over from the inside?” Thomas provided. 

“Fuckity fuck fuck,” I said. “So… We need to come up with a strenuous offensive. And not just because my sweet, speedster ass stands to turn up drained of all my liquid nitro blood by the Westward Bridge.”

“Yes, we do,” said Murphy. “Humans, sorcerers, metas, and vamps alike. We need to have like a Captain Planet and the Planeteers moment and just curbstomp the _crap_ out of this.”

“Earth! Fire! Wind! Water…” Zatanna started, and looked to Dick and me.

“ _Heart!”_ we supplied gleefully, and I was extra delighted to hear Harry and Murphy both join us in completing that homage to _Captain Planet._

“How do you _babies_ even know what that show is?” Murphy asked, laughing.

“Reruns!” I declared. 

“Same!” said Zatanna.

“Environmental Science class, junior year,” Dick said grandly. 

“So, Harry,” Zatanna said after the mirth died down, “I think it might be time to address the other elephant in the room--the one you said you have some thoughts about.”

Harry nodded. “Mmm. Yes, we do.”

I had a feeling as to what was coming. “What’s the elephant… although I think I know,” I said, shifting in my seat.

“If the spell on us was broken,” said Dick, looking over at me, “why don’t we feel any differently--that elephant?”

“Nailed it,” said Zatanna.

“Buckle up, kids, this is going to get awkward,” Harry said. “So. Guys. You touched one of Tariq’s enchanted objects. This enchantment he commissioned basically worked like a mix between ecstasy and alcohol--super incredible sex, gently manipulated memory--suggestions, more like--a blackout, a hangover. No _real_ memory of what happened afterward. As his targets--sometimes singles, sometimes groups--would go off to make whoopy somewhere, he’d follow them, and capitalize on that giant orgy, just binging on that lusty smorgasboard. He’d feed until he was properly sated--and to that end, strengthened, the recipients of the spell would make their way home, pass the hell out, and wake up thinking they’d had a little too much to drink the night before. No harm, no foul, no one’s hurt in the end. Not really, anyway--that part’s debatable, given the subject of consent, but that’s a conversation for another time. Tariq chose _you_ as potential targets because, his own omnisexuality aside, it just made sense to him, since you both appeared to be subject to feelings of lust for one another… _without_ the other pesky L word coming into play.”

“I was _sorely_ mistaken,” said Tariq ruefully.

“What are you talking about?” I asked, the heat rising in my gut and face with my amplifying nerves. 

“When I came to feed,” Tariq said, “what I encountered was _not_ lust.”

Silence.

“Okay, so what was it?” Dick said, a little impatiently.

“He’s indicating that he encountered _true love_ between the two of you,” said Thomas. “Fairy tales, hearts and flowers, capital L, the real deal. And that little emotion, my friends, is _toxic_ to a White Court vampire whose Hunger feeds on lust. We have literally the equivalent of an allergic reaction on the level of anaphylactic shock to it. My girlfriend, Justine? I can’t touch her, _because I love her._ Tariq couldn’t touch you--and _still_ can’t, and neither can I--because you love each other. And not platonically, not as bros, not in the sense of that fabled male camaraderie-- _you are in love._ As in… it’s the real McCoy.”

More silence, as Dick and I gawped at him. 

“That-that doesn’t make any sense,” Dick sputtered, waving his hands. “We’re _straight,_ we both are, we both have long-time girlfriends--”

“Well, nevertheless,” said Tariq unfeelingly. “I can’t get near either of you. I don’t know what more proof you require of what your true feelings for one another are.”

“Uh… Apologies,” Thomas interjected wryly. “Tariq wasn’t selected as a Hunter for his social skills. Granted, I guess if your job in life is to catch and kill big, greasy monsters, social skills probably don’t need to be a requirement.”

Dick wormed in his seat, and I rubbed uncomfortably at the back of my neck.

“I don’t… I don’t get it,” I said helplessly. “How the hell do you wake up straight one morning and then go to bed gay? Or bi? Or whatever?”

“Exactly--I mean… Since _when_ were we the Bi Wonder and Kid Slash?” Dick said, wildly gesturing. “I’m sorry--I just _don’t_ get how a lust spell ends up manifesting the exact opposite of how it’s supposed to. Can someone explain how that might happen? Please? In detail?”

“This spell was specifically intended to instill powerful urges to just bone every available object, be it animate or no, on whatever poor, unfortunate soul happened to come into contact with it,” said Bob. “As we’ve covered already. What happened to you was an anomaly unforeseen by the spellcaster--at least, that’s what I’m going to assume, since an error of this magnitude I can only _hope_ was unintentional on the part of the total poseur who crafted it. The fact is, lovebirds, it backfired. Powerfully.”

“So… Did it cast like, a _love_ spell on us instead?” I asked. 

“No,” said Bob. “Spells oriented around emotion _never_ result in the wrong one. Like, you’re not going to try to make a person miserable via a magic spell and then see them skipping over the rainbow with lollipops and a basket of kittens. I hate to crack this to you, but neither of you is enchanted or enthralled.”

Dick’s jaw clenched in obvious frustration. “Then _what happened?”_

“Okay, guys,” said Harry, his tone gentle. “I have an analogy, here. I know this isn’t the best comparison, because of the whole closet thing, but just bear with me--odds are, you like both. Men and women, I mean. Nothing wrong with that, as we all know. But you guys have identified as straight for so long that you probably never bothered to explore any other inclinations you might have had. Meanwhile, there’s something very real between the two of you-- _very_ real. And this _thing_ was suppressed for ages, and really, really sneaky. Think of it like that coat you have hanging in your closet--but you live in Florida. Every time you open the closet door to grab something, you see that coat, sometimes bump it, even, but you’re never actually _conscious_ of it. Then, one day, it’s cold outside! Like cold enough that guess what, you need that coat. And when you finally put it on, you think ‘Wow, this is perfect, like it’s tailored just right, it’s my favorite piece of clothing to wear now because it’s just so _me.’_ So… That snake? That was like you pulling the coat--your real, deep-seated, latent feelings for each other--off that hanger. Roasting the broomstick in that actual utility closet--don’t even get me started on all the puns there--that was like actually putting it on. And realizing hey, this fits. Honestly, the spell only got a ball that was already there rolling.” He paused. “And there won’t be any take-backsies here. The spell flipped a switch that was already there.”

Well.

Shit, piss, and damn.

An enormous, loaded silence fell on all of us. I had zero hope of keeping up with any of the thoughts that zoomed through my head as though they were beloved Uncle Barry and dear Cousin Bart running easy circles around me before my little vacay in the Speed Force. 

Dick finally spoke.

“Shit,” he said, and pressed his forehead into his hand. “Shit.”

I leaned back in my chair. 

“You said it, dude,” I said. “Shit. And… Cripes, _now_ what.”

“Well, that’s for you guys to decide,” said Harry. “But rest assured. Your feelings… They’re authentic, and they’re yours.”

“And now,” said Murphy, “apart from toasting the cute new couple here, we _really_ need to start discussing our plan of attack. Not to shove that by the wayside, but we _do_ need to get to work.”

The conversation hummed steadily on, falling on ears that just barely crafted any coherent impression of what was said. I’m surprised I retained one dang syllable--McAnally’s could have been turned into magical rubble the consistency of fairy dust around us and I probably wouldn’t have noticed, I was buried so deep inside my own wheeling mind. Furtive glances in Dick’s direction revealed that he, at least, was paying proper attention to the little hoedown taking place in the pub. I just couldn’t bring myself to listen. I had learned in the course of maybe an hour and a half that not only was I marked for death by some ancient, psycho vampire with a chip on her decaying shoulder, and who was also in cahoots with one of the most nefarious, batshit sorcerers ever to wave a magic wand and say “Bippity boppity boo,” but that Dick and I had, in this stranger-than-fiction reality, and unbeknownst to either of us for God only knew how long, been _in love_ \--real love, _true_ love, _Princess Bride,_ “as you wish” love--with one another. Never mind Artemis, never mind Babs, never mind that we had always assumed we exclusively liked girls.

It was a _lot_ to take in. 

And the idea that I might not even have time to start processing this load of info that was enough to generate a never-ending blue screen in my brain, because I’d possibly end up sucked totally dry, and not in the way I would have preferred, at the hands of this OP whacko Mavra in as soon as a week… 

Well, I could definitely think of a gajillion better ways to die. Speed Force dissemination even sounded preferable in some ways. I shuddered. There were plenty of natural anti-vampire defenses built into my body--but what if this bitch actually, like… _bit_ me? Would I end up like her? How would a speedster and a vampire translate? Spiraling down into _these_ horrid thoughts, I kind of just wanted… Well, like Dick had said--a hug, a warm blankie, and maybe a teddy bear. Or maybe, and I cringed at the painful _sappiness_ of it, just him.

I reached over, and, my movements slow and questing, took his hand. I calmed, the strung up muscles of my shoulders loosening, when he laced his fingers in mine, and squeezed reassuringly. Ugh. _So. Damn. Sorry,_ Artemis and Babs. 

“It’ll be fine,” Dick murmured. “It’ll be okay, seriously. We’re all here. And this vampire twat shows up trying to get at your blood--I’ll be ready.”

“Aw, my hero,” I gaffed--but I won’t lie. His words comforted me. A _lot._

He grinned. “It’s what I do.” 

I took a breath, and with a Herculean effort, rallied. I’d just have to figure all this shit out later--how I was going to stay alive, how I was going to keep Dick (ready a hundred and ten percent to throw himself right into Nosferatu’s jaws) among the living and out of the ranks of undead blood-suckers as well, what I was going to do about my innocent victim girlfriend… and what I was going to do about my sorta-boyfriend/weekend lover/”fishing buddy.”

I released that breath. Time to work.

  
  
  



	6. Act 6: Within Temptation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, everyone! ^_^
> 
> Ah, the last filler chapter before the finale... :D :D Hopefully the least BORING filler, though, since this chapter sports the last (and arguably, the most graphic) love scene. <3 <3 
> 
> So! I'm going specifically by the Young Justice character stats--Dick's portrayed in the series as a pretty good sight bigger than his comic norm. <3 <3
> 
> Be warned--much fluff/mush ahead, definitely not my strong suit. XD Many thanks to my dear friend Libraryman85 for his tremendous help to that end. <3 <3 Still, I hope you enjoy!! <3 <3 ^_^
> 
> Much love to all! 
> 
> Xoxoxoxoxo  
> ~EF

I leaned back in the passenger seat, resting my feet on the dash. I watched the woodlands and fields of Indiana roll past, the green of the leaves burnished in white-gold from the heavy sunshine. 

We were driving because, as it turned out, Harry couldn’t go anywhere near the Zeta Tubes without completely frying them. Mystical energies, so Zatanna told us, tended to concentrate around magic users of his variety, and all those swirling energy fields wreaked havoc reminiscent of fantastical cataclysms on unsuspecting machinery.

“So… Why is it you can Zeta, then? And use a cell phone? And Harry here can’t?” I asked Zatanna as she climbed into Murphy’s car. 

“My power is inverse,” she explained. “Meaning I use my own energies to generate my spells. Harry, on the other hand, draws from external energy, and it concentrates around him. Hence, it plays Merry Cob with tech, kind of like cell signals interfering with radio equipment. At some point, we might be able to make him a suit or something that will allow him to use our stuff, but I’d need to get with someone like Silas Stone from STAR Labs to figure out something like that.”

It made sense, but that meant we had to get from Chicago to Gotham the old school way--by vehicle. I could obviously run to Gotham, but Dick was way too heavy for me to carry comfortably anymore, and I didn’t feel like making multiple trips through the furnace of Hell (sorry, the July heat) to shuttle everyone back to New Jersey one by one. Bruce, conveniently, happened to have a garage under his penthouse apartment in Chicago (for real? Did the guy have houses in every city in America? How about every country across the globe? Was he extending his vacay homes to other planets now, too? I was starting to think so), so Dick raided it and picked out a comfy Rolls to head back to Gotham in. Harry whistled through his teeth.

“Damn, you guys really are like, Tony Stark-loaded, aren’t you?” he said. “Do you have a pool of money that you just dive into and swim in at the end of the day? Like a family of Scrooge McDucks?”

Dick grinned. “Sorry, I can’t disclose that information,” he said. “See you in… crap, several hours. Man, I’m really not used to this at this point.”

“What, having to actually travel?” asked Harry.

“Yeah, God forbid Trust Fund Kid here actually have to do something of remotest inconvenience,” said Dick. “Can’t we just… _Magic_ our way over there?”

“Not unless you want to suck me dry right before our title bout with Mavra, and also not unless you want to attempt going through the Nevernever. Which most mortals--and plenty of immortals--prefer to avoid.”

Dick nodded. “The sound of that alone. Oh, well, worth a try.”

“Sorry, man. We’ll see you when we stop for eats,” Harry said, and climbed into the car with Murphy, Thomas, and Zatanna. Tariq would be driving on his own, per his request. Dick and I would be alone in our car, and I had a feeling as to why. I hovered between feeling relieved and totally annoyed.

I shifted in the seat, tuning into the familiar, comforting sounds of our favorite collective band from pretty much college for me, high school for him, wrestling a pang of nostalgia. Back in 2015, Dick and I had actually seen them in concert, and being who he was, he (of course) got us backstage without even having to invest in passes. We both nursed semi-stalkerish crushes on the band’s former drummer, and on a juvenile whim, I dared him to try scoring a liplock with her. I was _sort of_ joking, but whether I was kidding or not, _he_ took the dare seriously, and amping his charm up to the Demi-God of Toothpaste tier, he made good on that dare. I wasn’t… _overly_ jealous, not really, mostly just complaisantly envious. Given my taken status and everything. Besides, that make-out sesh had its advantages--they’re still pals that talk at least weekly to this day, even for all that she left the band, and by proxy, so are we. Pretty cool. 

I sighed. Things were _way_ freaking easier then. 

“So Kaldur manipulates external energy,” I observed, deciding not to dwell on less angsty times gone by. “Why doesn’t _he_ send all of the Zetas and tech we’re around on a daily basis to an immediate short-circuited, watery grave?”

“You’re asking the wrong person,” Dick said. “That’s probably more a question for Harry or Z. I’m guessing the energies might actually be contained in the water swords, sort of like water in a bottle, but don’t quote me on that.”

I nodded. “Eh, I’ll accept that theory.”

I pulled my phone from my hip pocket to half-heartedly touch base with my girlfriend. Damn. A couple of missed calls from Artemis. I sent her a text.

_How’s warrrrkkkkk_

A little while later, spent in amiable silence with Dick as we just coasted through Indiana and let the music fill the quiet, I got a reply.

 _It was good,_ she sent. _Done now, just hanging out with teh puppehhhhh <3 We miss you. How’s Dick doing? When do you think you’ll be home?_

I really couldn’t stand it anymore.

_Artemis--we really do need to just sit down and TALK when I get back. I wasn’t lying this morning. There’s a massive story here that involves some magic mojo and vampires and incubi and whatnot, so just promise me you’ll let me and Dick keep our manhood when I get around to explaining._

There was a buzz shortly thereafter, and with perspiring trepidation, I checked the screen of my phone.

_Repeat, please?_

I did. 

_Like I said, Art. I wasn’t lying._

Buzz:

_So… you’re telling me you actually cheated…?? With fucking DICK???_

I heaved a sigh.

_Yes._

Buzz:

… _Wow. Just… Wow, Wally. I can’t tell if I’m pissed or heartbroken or confused or betrayed or just… insanely fuckin curious. Now I KNOW you’ve been avoiding me. I can’t believe THIS is why… Pick up your goddamn phone._

I sent her a response: 

_I’d rather talk in person, TBH. There’s just so damn much going on here. And right now the game is afoot and Dick and I are working with Z and some of her wizarding buddies to deal with it. I’ll probably be MIA for the rest of the weekend unless we have to call you guys in for backup when the time comes._

She replied:

 _Wally. I need a minute._

I sighed, and sent:

_I understand._

She _finally_ texted after an eternity of Indiana and Ohio countryside rolled by, after Dick and I had conversed and tapered into quiet in fluctuating intervals, after we’d listened to every existing Colourist album. 

_Okay,_ her text began. _So, all things considered, I guess I’m not… REAL shocked to learn incubi are real. We work with Martians and magicians and Kryptonians and Greek gods for crying out loud XP~ I’m guessing you and Dick got it on because some incubus somewhere had you smoking sexy magic crack that made you guys suddenly feel like hopping up on the old pogo stick?? Am I on base here?_

Another buzz:

_In that case, I’m not, like… happy about it or anything, just because… I dunno it’s kinda violating for you guys and it’s def not fair to me and Babs, but I’m not like… pissed about it either for that same reason. It’s not your fault. On a serious note, are you guys okay?_

I sighed, partly with relief, and partly with dread. The conversation was _still_ going to be harder than Evan Stone’s cock on a daily basis, but at least she had part of the truth and was appeased for the time being. I could drop the atom bomb of my “latent repressed feelings for my best friend that are now a blossoming romance between once heterosexual dudes” on her when the time came, and… I guessed we could figure it out. 

I texted her. 

_We’re… okay enough, I guess. Confused. Awkward. Dealing with shit that has us in this way over our heads._

She responded:

_I can only imagine. You don’t have to get into detail, but what all did you guys do?_

I gritted my teeth, and, sweating bullets, replied:

 _Uh… pretty much everything, Art. That includes pitching and catching on both sides._

A buzz:

_Oh, damn, son. Ha ha were you sore :P Does Dick have a big dick? I’m seriously now just curious more than anything_

I was shocked to find that I was fighting laughter.

_Goddammit Artemis :P_

She responded:

_Sorry, I just ahhhh I wish I could have seen it. You’re both so hot :P if this sitch wasn’t so damn messed up I’d be begging Babs for a four-on before the incubi crack wears off XD_

I laughed out loud into my hand, making Dick look inquiringly over at me. 

_LOL well I can think of way worse-looking dudes to get plowed up the ass by. Maybe that four-on will happen after all ;D_

I smiled when I got her reply:

 _LMAO--don’t tempt me, babe :P Seriously, though, I just hope you guys are okay. I’m sorry this is going on… God, it’s so fucked up. :-/ Incubi are assholes >.< I’m weirdly really glad you leveled with me, though… I know that took some serious gonads. Even though I AM pissed it happened at all. XP~ We’ll talk more about it when you get home. Love you <3 And Dick, too <3 _

I looked over at Dick. “Artemis says she loves you.”

He snorted.

“I take it you haven’t told her what’s going on,” he said wryly.

“Actually, I did,” I said. “Not, umm… Not all of it, just the whammying part. I’ll talk to her about the rest when I get home.”

“In that case, tell her I love her, too,” he said. “I’m also pretty ecstatic that I don’t need to start sleeping with my dong in solitary for its own protection.”

I sent: 

_He loves you too and is glad you’re not going to castrate him :D_

She wrote back: 

_Not yet :D_

I grinned, and found that I was marginally more optimistic. 

_Well,_ I thought, stretching, and glancing over at Dick’s stunning profile, _I’m just going to enjoy this while it lasts, then._

Although, I couldn’t help wondering--

“Have you talked to Barbara yet?” I asked Dick.

His jaw visibly clenched, and he turned the music down. 

“No. Not in total honesty, anyway,” he said. “She’s got a mission she needs to be concentrating on right now, and in any case, I’d rather talk about this face-to-face with her.” He sighed. “Not that I can really see _that_ panning out so well for me…” He gave me a sorrowing look. “Well, Wally, it’s been nice knowing you. I’d like for my body to be donated to science and all of my money left to Gunther and Gurbel so they can enjoy a well-deserved retirement in some posh sanctuary somewhere.”

“Well,” I told him, “when Artemis gets the H-bomb of ‘I have legit feels for my best pal’ dropped on her, I’ll be right in line for castration with you, so I’ll tell you what--I’ll hold your hand if you’ll hold mine while we get our balls chopped.”

“Oh, screw that noise. If _that’s_ how this is going to end up, I don’t know about you, but I’m finding a shack on a cliff on some remote desert planet somewhere. Preferably in the farthest reaches of the universe, accessible only by wormhole. You’re welcome to join me in my new digs if you want to protect your nuts.”

“Count me in, dude,” I said. I looked over at him. “…You really should talk to her, though. It’s not fair to her, man.”

There was an interim of silence.

“I know,” he said soberly. “But…”

Another period of quiet passed, as I waited for him to continue. 

When he didn’t immediately, I pressed him. 

“But what?” I prompted.

He looked over at me, that _Look_ (the one that would come to totally destroy me in a heartbeat over and over again) coming over his beautiful features. “Well, call me an actual dick, but… I’m just not sure I’m ready to face having to possibly give this up yet.”

I gazed at him a moment, trying to settle my heart as it unexpectedly fluttered in my chest (which, at Flash-fam speeds, is instant blackout territory for pedestrian non-metas.) _God,_ this was still so _weird_ \--looking at him and feeling those obnoxious (but, okay, kind of pleasant) “flutterbyes” (thanks for the term, Mom) that went pittering through my entire system. I hadn’t had a single flutterbye go traipsing through my nerve endings, rendering the interior of my body a freaking Disney musical, since my teens, when I was susceptible to--oh, dare I say it… okay, I do-- _new love_ , and the rush of excitement and adrenaline that’s its trademark. I studied the locks of dark hair that curled at the nape of his neck, falling around his ears and across his brow, and I reached over to run my fingers through it. He turned to me, and smiled, the sunlight through the window enlivening the blue of his eyes, vibrant lapis beneath the girly fan of sooty lashes. He was so _fucking hot._ It should have been illegal.

I leaned over, and dropped a kiss on his jaw, resting my cheek briefly on his shoulder. 

“Me, either,” I admitted.

I straightened after a moment, as Dick fiddled with the music, and then gave me something of a mock burning-pining-perishing expression. I gazed at him quizzically, until the music started back up. I gawped at him, instantly recognizing the opening, and burst out laughing.

“Dude, did you seriously just Rick Roll me?” I asked in horror.

He grinned, and, in his best Rick Astley impersonation, bellowed out, “We’re no strangers to love…”

I joined in. “You know the rules, and _so do I!”_

Well, like I said. I was just going to enjoy this while it lasted. If it absolutely had to end after the following day, damn it-- _I’d make this last night count._ Starting with caterwauling to the song every human being on this earth loves to hate.

*******

We stopped for dinner in Philadelphia, and, seated at a table in the backmost corner of the Hungry Pigeon, hashed out a plan of attack regarding our quarry. Tariq opted to um, _feed_ elsewhere. For added privacy, Zatanna flexed her sorceress muscles and cast a pretty spiffy new spell, one that apparently left anyone within earshot wholeheartedly disinterested in anything we had to say, and better yet, totally forgetful of anything they might overhear. 

With the enemy’s stats presented to us, it became glaringly clear that we were likely going to have to call in outside help from our compatriots. Dick maintained that he wanted to keep that requested aid limited to people that he _knew_ we could trust--with both our lives, and with this new, open secret of ours (i.e. Jason, Tim, Bart, and Jaime--close family members that as such stood to cast the least stringent judgment on us for the fact that we’d cuckolded our Others), but Harry and Co. weren’t confident about our odds with only a handful of skilled humans and metas in our corner. 

“You haven’t met Jay,” said Dick with a smile. “He’d knock that bitch’s rotten teeth right out of her skull.”

Harry smiled humorlessly. “He’d try, and probably wind up a dried up prune for it.”

Dick frowned. “Oh, come on.” 

“Look, Dick--Mavra’s a heavy hitter,” Harry explained. “A _scary_ heavy hitter. Generally, this is the enemy you level all your big guns on, from the get-go, with very little strategy other than just boom, boom, boom. We’ll _need_ something of a game plan--but moreover, we need the muscle to back it up, or fall back on if things go awry. Even the most intricate plan with the most flawless execution isn’t going to amount to much if she’s able to overpower it--and it’s pretty safe to assume that she’s perfectly capable of doing so.”

“Is she that powerful?” I asked. “I mean, her stats are impressive, but come on. We’ve got like, Superman and Martian Manhunter and Captain Marvel in our corner. Can’t they--”

“I get that, Wally, but while Mavra might be sensitive to fire, like Martian Manhunter, that doesn’t mean she’s incapable of wielding it--a _lot_ of it. And from what Z tells me, any sorcerer worth his salt can unravel the enchantment around Captain Marvel, too. And… not to poke the bear here, but isn’t Superman kind of…” He wormed his lip. “Weak against magic?”

Dick, again, frowned, and nodded. “He’s got a handful of weaknesses that we don’t really like to advertise, but yeah, magic’s one of them.”

“Okay, well, Mavra some years back damn near became a dark goddess--as in crazy-stupid-omnipotent powerful--with the Word of Kemmler.” He sat back in his seat. “All hail the mighty Twat of Darkness… Crazy as it might sound, even Superman might have met something of a match in her if she’d succeeded.”

“…Shit.”

“Harry, just admit it,” Murphy said suddenly, eyeing him over the top of her menu. “You just want to work with Batman.”

“All right!” Harry conceded, lifting his hands. “I can’t keep any secrets. I want to work with the Dark Knight, damn it!”

Dick rolled his eyes, although he smiled, too. “Ask and ye shall receive…” He booted up his encrypted comm device, and spent some time texting on it. 

“Batman’s in,” he announced after a while, killing the comm. “So are Red Hood and Robin. They’re getting together with an associate to craft some weapons tailored against Mavra.”

“What kind of weapons?” asked Thomas. 

“Think _Underworld_ ,” Dick explained. “The idea Bats is going to present to his consultant is basically a way to harness Black Court sensitivities, those being UV radiation and garlic and super holy holy water and so on, into a Bat-friendly weapon, like a bola or a Batarang. If you want, Murph, I can have them look into constructing some toys specially for you that will pack the same punch. Since, you know,” here he gave her an apologetic look, “working with the JLA unfortunately means no guns.”

“I think I can cope with that,” she said. “Ooohhh, Harry, I get to play with Bat toys!”

“If you get your hands on a Batarang,” Harry said, “I’m framing it and hanging it on my wall. Anyway, on the unlucky chance we’ll be looking at Renfields and Darkhounds, I’m also casting a vote that we bring in your pal Beast Boy. My dog Mouse would be a pretty big help, but he’s got a critical job at this point that I don’t want to interrupt.”

“Which basically means we’re going to need to get not just BB, but Superboy and Wolf in on this,” I said. I turned to Dick. “I’ll raise Conner if you’ll get with Gar.”

“Isn’t anyone going to call in Wonder Woman?” asked Thomas wistfully. 

“Yeah, dude,” I said, grinning. “You could fight alongside a legit _goddess.”_

Harry grinned back. “Speaking of Greek gods. I wonder how Wonder Woman would actually _feel_ if she knew I’ve met Hades. Oh, and his dog, incidentally named Spot.”

“Spot?” Dick said with a laugh. “Seriously?”

“That, I shit you not, is what Cerberus translates to,” said Harry. “Hades is actually a pretty pleasant guy, for all that he’s the evil overlord of the Underworld. Who named his dog Spot. And has a vault packed with so much _treasure_ even Dick’s foster dad would weep at the sight.”

“Okay, I want this story,” I said, leaning toward him. 

“Dude, me, too,” said Dick. “Spill.”

The next hour or so saw the lot of us just swapping stories--companionably, with a sense of fun and ease, and between us, we really had a trove of captivating tales to share. Murphy’s cop stories, her experiences in Special Investigations, her many adventures and misadventures with Harry. Thomas’ _fascinatingly_ dysfunctional White Court family. And Harry’s… Just, holy shit, the _stories_ that guy had. The _stories,_ people. By the end of that long, amiable conversation, I’m astonished Dick and I weren’t wearing “Harry Dresden” tee-shirts and Tweeting excitedly about having met our greatest hero before Murph finally got us back on track. 

At the end of our brainstorming session, we had a reasonable lineup--Conner and Wolf, Garfield, Kaldur, the Bat Family minus Barbara, Uncle Barry, Miss Martian, Bart, and Jaime. And yes, to Thomas’ fanboy pleasure, Wonder Woman. I was honestly glad no one brought up Artemis (likely by design)--she frankly didn’t need to see Dick and me gallivanting hand-in-hand, as though we were rubbing her nose in this weird affair we were having. Equally, we had a decent enough game plan in place, that we intended to brief our team members on before the mission itself the following day. I felt heartened somewhat, but a little nervous--if it was as painfully obvious how stupid-twitterpated Dick and I were as Zatanna alleged, we were _totally_ screwed if we planned on trying to keep our new bizarre relationship status a secret. Bruce, I knew, would figure it out within a nanosecond of looking at us--the guy was a freaking _warlock._ So much for easing everyone into the idea, if we opted to pursue it--not that it was something _we’d_ been eased into. I shoved _that_ discomfiting thought out of my brain as we got up to meet Tariq and finish out the trip to New Jersey.

Bruce had given all of us permission to crash at one of his penthouses in Gotham, something I was pretty damn grateful for, given how stiff I’d gotten (ugh, in more torturesome ways than one) on that long-ass, neverending, insufferable car ride. Being in such close proximity to Dick, knowing that he and I were alone in the car, that this little intrigue wasn’t quite so clandestine or taboo as it had been the day before, I was having a _very_ hard time-- _literally_ \--keeping my hands off of him. I might have entertained a fantasy or ten of giving Dick the ultimate road head that would run the risk of sending us coasting through a guardrail (hashtag, worth it!), or of stroking him off in under a minute even through his jeans (hashtag, go me!), or of clandestinely just pulling over in yet another oh-fuck-it moment to plow him across a park bench in the darkness of the evening at some sequestered, unpopulated highway rest stop (hashtag, le sexy time with boo!) All the while I just got miserably harder and harder, and _really_ fought to resist rubbing one out in secret while he focused obliviously on driving. We finally rolled into city limits at damn near four in the morning after stopping at a convenience store to pick up basic overnight needs (did I raid the uh, personal section and purchase some goods on the sly? …Ask me no questions, I’ll tell you no lies.) Murphy immediately split off to investigate the gym on the bottommost level of the townhome, while Harry and Zatanna worked together to build up magical defenses around the place in case Mavra smelled a rat and came looking for Harry, or decided to come after me in an effort to get my blood. Tariq the Mysterious found himself a high-end hotel elsewhere--something that didn’t surprise me at this point, given how _standoffish_ he’d been the entire time we’d had real contact with him.

“You make him uncomfortable,” Thomas explained, finding a bottle of port, and, with an approving look, opened it. “Like I said, you guys are pretty smitten with each other. He had a situation similar to the one I’m in some years ago, but the difference is, he totally lost it--and his girl died.”

“Oh, no,” said Dick.

“Oh, yeah,” said Thomas. “Welcome to the life of a vampire of the White Court…” He shook his head. “He was burned almost past recognition in the process. Don’t even ask about what the healing process was like or what was done to restore him. He’s understandably been a bit of a wreck since. It’s partly why he’s so adept at Hunting--he _pours_ himself into it. Being around you guys plus Harry and Murph is just kind of… I don’t know, like a constant slap in the face.”

“So Harry and Murph _are_ a Thing?” I asked. “I mean, I kind of got that impression, but…”

Thomas lifted a shoulder. “Eh, it’s complicated. They might as well be together _in theory,_ but aren’t actively calling it anything and haven’t even gotten it on, last I checked. Oh, well, maybe with all this amazing alcohol they’ll _fucking finally_ get ployed into it.”

“We can put them up in the sex room,” Dick suggested. “The one that comprises the entire third floor of this place with the giant bed and fireplace and jacuzzi. Did I mention the satin sheets and the bear skin rug? Because yeah, those are there, too.”

“Why does it gross me out so much that Bruce’s penthouse has a _sex room_?” I said.

“He’s got a rep to uphold, dude,” Dick said. “Look, we’re going to have to double up anyway, since we’ve got six people to distribute between three beds, and sadly I don’t think I can keep who I want to share _my_ pad with tonight a secret--so yeah, let’s just… stick them in the sex room.”

I twitched in my jeans, and shifted uncomfortably. My hands started to shake. I inhaled through my nose, and counted to ten, for what good it did. I just stayed hard and miserable, my abdomen fizzing and warming. 

“I guess that leaves me with Zatanna…” said Thomas.

“Try it, bro, and I’ll fucking kill you,” Dick said pleasantly, smiling ear-to-ear, squaring his impressive shoulders. “That leaves you on the couch.”

Dick didn’t get jealous where Zatanna was concerned (and honestly, the word was never really in his vocabulary to begin with), but he _did_ get protective of her on occasion--not discrediting her ability to take care of herself. And truthfully, I didn’t like the idea of a sexy incu-pire who supposedly had a loving girlfriend that he couldn’t touch potentially trying to feed off of Zatanna, my _friend_ , either. 

“Dude,” said Thomas, looking somewhere between amused and genuinely offended, “I’m _kidding._ I kind of assumed as much. I’m not like Tariq, and that aside, I have an exclusive girlfriend, remember? That I’m very happy with for all I can’t touch her, thank you very much. Besides, I have ways of feeding without hurting anyone.”

“Oh, yeah?” said Dick, untensing slowly. “How so?”

“I am,” and here Thomas launched into possibly the most hilarious of absurdly bad accents the world has ever seen, some ridiculous amalgamation between suave Frenchman and totally flamboyant gay guy, “the owner of the newly reopened _tres chic_ beauty salon and coffee shop, the Coiffure Cup, and I feed in harmless doses off of my lady clients as I run my hands through their beautiful hairs.”

I tilted my head. “You can feed by… making coffee and cutting hair?”

Thomas nodded. “Oh, yeah, man, touching another person’s hair is actually a very intimate thing. It’s not like the full-blown act of lustful sex, but there’s a level of non-loving relation to it, meaning it’s enough that I can kind of _sip_ at what I need without gorging harmfully on it. I did it years ago pretty effectively, and figured it’s time I rekindled the strategy.”

“Clever,” said Dick. He passed a hand over his face, and rubbed at his temple. “Guys, I don’t know about you, but I’m _exhausted._ I’m turning in for the night. Wally, I’ll see you up there, okay?”

“Eh, I’m pretty beat, too,” I said. “Right behind you, man.”

Yeah, yeah. Beat, whatever. Speaking of _right behind him_. Ha, ha. Dick lifted his brows in a moment of silent communion, and turned on his heel to head hastily to the stairwell. Gleefully, thrilled that he was right there in the horny-ass boat with me, I nabbed the bag of unmentionables I’d purchased under the radar, and fell into step at his back.

We ignored Thomas as he snickered knowingly, swirling some of the port into a sipper that sparkled elaborately under the light fixtures (a single one of which probably cost more than my parents’ house.) I was careful not to appear _too_ eager as I followed Dick up the steps; although, given that his back was to me and I had the perfect view from my position, I can’t say I didn’t ogle the hell out of his flawless ass on the way up to the second floor. 

At least I’m honest. Right?

Upon arriving in the selected penthouse bedroom, I shut the door, and locked it. My gut burned and clenched, painfully jerking my cock in my jeans. I attempted to concentrate my erratic breathing, and failed abysmally. Turning to him, I stood in silence, _trying_ to keep it together through my fevered respiration, just gazing at him without speaking, as he switched on the bedside lamp, bathing the room in a warm, buttery, lucent glow. By the time he turned--God, I couldn’t _take_ it anymore. Fuck talking. This was our last night, and damn it, like I said--I was going to _make_ that shit count.

In a blink, I was _on him--_ having shamelessly rocketed myself there with my speed. I barely gave him a chance to move on his own, yanking him to me, devouring his lips, his tongue, relishing his eager response. I moved my mouth to his jaw, down to his neck. I yanked the shirt from him, paused just long enough to let him do the same to me, and then I hauled back and shoved him _hard_ into the wall by the nightstand, rattling a framed painting loose from its hanging. He expelled something of an exhilarated laugh, and didn’t resist when I, in a flash (ha), slammed against him, pressing him into the wood paneling. I didn’t give any more shits about lead-up or amplification than I did about talking--we’d had a goddamn twelve-hour road trip _plus_ the time we’d taken for dinner and confabs for that sentimental crap. I thudded in one motion to my knees and savagely tore his jeans open, splitting the zipper and popping the button right off (whoops, sorry), and then gave his hapless boxers equal treatment. I grasped him, tight and squeezing, delighting in the sound of his voice as he hissed and moaned. I drew the inside of my lower lip over the straining, growing length of his erection, swept my tongue over the slit at the head, and then swallowed him down-- _all_ the way down, deep as I could possibly take him without gagging myself. He cried out, and I _felt_ that cry as it echoed through my body. I hummed in response, fluttering my throat around him, and dug my hands into his hips, drawing my fingers up to the small of his back, pressing them into the skin there. His legs wavered, and I enveloped his thighs with my arms, embracing him, supporting his weight, preventing him from folding when his knees buckled. I passed my tongue beyond my lower lip, gliding it over the camber of his sack, flexing my gullet, and then relaxing so that he could thrust his hips, pressing his cock even deeper into my throat. 

_That’s it, fuck my mouth, remind me how to breathe later by not letting me now--_

He came in minutes, screaming, his legs going to water, falling over my shoulders with his arms dangling limp over the breadth of my back. I let the fluid pour down my throat, swallowing languidly, basking in the shudders that wracked his entire body. I let his spent sex slip from my lips, the motion wresting a startled groan from his hoarse voice, leaving a mess of cum and saliva on my chin that I was entirely heedless of, by now _completely_ berserk with carnal, animal _need_. My own hardness shifted desperately in my jeans, hot, damp, painful. In my crazed hurry, I tripped spectacularly over the pile of Dick’s jeans where they lay in a discarded heap as I went pell-mell for the shopping bag (okay, that was embarrassing, but whatever--thankfully, I don’t think he noticed, anyway.) I peeled my own jeans off, rolled a condom over my erection in hasty, jerking motions, and then lubed myself up with fumbling hands. I chucked the bottle atop the bed, where I could get to it with ease later. Returning to where Dick sagged against the wall, still swimming and dazed where he’d sunk down to a squat, I forced myself to stay patient, and coaxed him into standing, kissing him, pressing my tongue into his mouth, letting him sample himself, much as he had me the night before. When he reciprocated, his lips closing tight around my tongue, his hands _daring_ to touch my aching, blazing hot arousal with quivering fingers, even with the barrier of the condom what little control I had left just went poof, _evanesco_ , abra cadabra, good-fuckin’-bye at the cannonade of sensation that exploded through my inguen. I spun to hurl him with all my strength across the bed on his front, and gave him an absolutely tremendous slap on the ass. If that startled him, I couldn’t say--I was kind of operating on single-minded tunnel vision, color me guilty. I grasped his hips, pressed my lips to the base of his spine, flitting my tongue against the smooth, feverous skin there, and then, on a wild, impassioned impulse, traced a line _downward_. He gasped, lurching in shock, and I gripped him harder, closing my hold over his solid obliques. This… this was a whole _other_ forbidden fruit, untasted even with Artemis, and I roved my tongue over this new, once verboten territory with a boldness that surprised me, exploring, experimenting, savoring the tectonic shivers that ran perceptibly up and down his body, the overwrought timbre of his shaking voice as he repined into the comforter beneath him.

I shifted back up, running my tongue in a slick, even trail over the eskers of his spine, all the way up to the cervical of his vertebrae. I kissed the salty flesh of his neck, drawing the skin between my lips, somehow satisfied in knowing he’d have a killer hickie there later. Without disentangling myself, I found the bottle of lubricant. As I got him primed, I moved my lips to his ear. 

“Not gonna do this soft,” I said, breathless, my voice undulating, a sea in storm. “You okay with that?”

“Do it, Wally, I can take it,” he breathed, equally winded. 

I damn near came in the bag. Somehow, though, I didn’t--I’d have claimed a Christmas miracle if it was December.

“We’ll see,” I said fiendishly, sucking at his earlobe.

I traced a line down the curve of his back, grasped my hardness, and, guiding my way, pressed inward, sliding down inside him, as slowly as I could stand, until I was buried deep in the hot, tremulous narrowing of his essence. I inhaled the scent of his hair, my cheek pressed to the damp, tousled locks, and mouthed the auricle of his ear. 

I shifted my hands to his hips, anchoring myself, and rose up, sinking even deeper inside of him, sensing the pressure as he tensed hard around me with a gasp. I ran my palms over the range of his back, gentle, massaging his muscles until he settled and unwound, working to keep him relaxed, attuned to the rhythm of his breathing, the ardor of his willingness. Then, frenetic and appetent, molecules shivering and skipping, I canted for the barest second, just kind of revving myself up. Then, fucking _finally,_ with an untrammeled ferocity, I drew back, and with all of my weight and strength, _threw_ myself into him--thrusting furiously, unrestrained, unchecked, gloriously libertine. I gripped his hips so hard I left bruises, _big_ ones, mottled and multi-colored, that I would find later (my bad.) I hadn’t ever just… _let loose_ like that, and knowing that Dick had probably a good sixty, seventy pounds on Artemis (not to mention upwards of twenty on me), I didn’t really get hung up on holding back for my partner’s sake like I customarily did, and since he was sufficiently lubed up and remained tolerably pliant beneath the onslaught, I kept on, even as he fell flat to his belly, clutching at the headboard of the bed.

I felt the telltale tightening in my abdomen, signaling my own screaming, happy ending, and I quickened, voicing unabashed into the close, humming air, determined to reach the earth-shattering orgasm that hovered scant seconds away. 

I cried out in shocked letdown and total confusion when Dick abruptly rose, twisting upwards, all but chucking me off of him, sending me teetering onto my back atop the bed. For a bewildered, stupid moment, I stared at the crazily rotating ceiling, my breath lost, reality lagging. Before I could ask what the hell was going on, why he had just shoved me away from him like that, if I had done something wrong, he had clambered over me, sweeping his hands over my hair, clasping either side of my face. He straddled me at the waist, leaning down, covering my lips with his, smothering my sounds of protest and nonplus. He lifted up, his fingers trickling over my shoulders, grazing the flesh of my upturned forearms, lighting millions of fires across my nerve endings and raising every hair on the surface of my skin. 

“What--” I gasped.

“This might not work the way I want it to,” he said, cutting me off, his voice irregular and charged, “but damn it--I want to try it.” 

Before I even figured out what the fuck he was talking about, he reached back to grip my cock, and bore down on me, his weight supported by his quads. I felt the warm constriction close gradually around my hardness as I speared slowly into him, his thighs tightening around my hips as I rose up in that initial moment of surprise. 

Oh.

So _that’s_ why he hurled me off of him. 

Well, I could cope with power-bottoming--I enjoyed some headbutting over dom/sub roles in the sack, sure, but the appeal of that to me was more in the fun inherent in a bit of good-natured competition--I wasn’t personally all that into the traditional understanding of domination over my partner.

I lost all ability to breathe and any tethering to real-time when Dick leaned back, bracing himself on my outstretched legs. The weight that position placed on me where I inclined inside his body, coupled with his movement as he rose and fell--oh. Holy. Sweet. Jesus. My interior lit up in one big, slow-motion fireworks display that rolled in an unfolding blaze through my core and limbs, flashing into a starburst of heat that about vaporized me in one shot when he grasped his rekindled hardness in one hand, stroking with rousingly firm, tenacious motions, completely unapologetic, totally in plain sight, maintaining his ballast with his opposite. I rolled my hips in time with his soft, unhurried rhythm, not breathing, not _able_ to, watching myself in captive fascination as I slid in and out of him. For not having done this before, I thought muzzily, he didn’t seem to have any difficulty whatsoever figuring it out. I couldn’t stop myself moaning in shellacked powerlessness, seconds from disintegrating, my chest leaping with my inbreath. My crescendo amped itself, rapidly mounting and rising maddeningly in my middle. 

When I reached that grand finale, it was with a suddenness and power equal to that of a goddamn bullet train--about blacking me out, blowing out my eardrums, and rupturing my heart and lungs all at once. My molecules skittered violently as I sobbed my climax into the close, loaded air, my body gone half see-through, intermittently oscillating back and forth from somatic form. Even as I came undone under that atomizing peak, I heard the sound of his voice echoing through the cavernous space of the bedroom, and then felt the thick, opaque fluid as it spattered in heavy threads across my chest. 

The warmth of his weight followed as he sank down atop me, paying zero mind to the mess of his own cum on my skin, and we lay like that for a time that seemed concurrently an eternity and a blink, our sweat mingling and cooling in the climatized air. 

Finally, Dick lifted his head, looking down at me, and drew a hand up to run it over my hair. 

“…Wow,” he said, a smile spreading slowly over his face, his palm hot on my cheek. 

“Yeah,” I murmured, smiling back. I reached up, tracing the shape of his jawline. “Wow.”

He kissed me, and I drank in the feeling of his lips on mine, sensing my heart as it gradually slowed, coming off of its febrile, passionate pace from before. After a moment, he shifted some of his weight from me, and rested in quiet. 

His voice dispelled the silence after a while.

“Well,” he said, “I’m, umm…” He screwed up his face, then laughed. “I’m going to feel that tomorrow…”

I lifted my head in a panic. “Oh, God, dude, I’m sorry.”

Dick shook his head, and smiled. “Oh, Wally, don’t be. Totally worth it.”

I fidgeted unhappily, feeling like a consummate asshole. “Are you going to be okay to, uh…”

“Do battle with vampires and thralls while I have no meta skills and no sorcery to fall back on?” Dick supplied. He shrugged, and gave me a brash grin. “Pretty sure I’ll be fine, dude. The first time Babs and I pegged I actually wound up getting into it hand-to-hand with none other than Vandal Savage less than an hour later.”

I grimaced. “Oh, shit, man.”

He chuckled ruefully. “Yeah. Let me tell you, that was _not_ a good day for me. So… as long as I’ve got you know, an unlimited arsenal of vampire-themed Bat toys tomorrow, we can all chill--I think I got this.”

“Today, more like,” I said, glancing at the clock. The dawn was just coloring the sky a listless shade of muted aqua, diffusing deep teal over the Gotham skyscrapers.

“Today,” he amended. “Damn.”

“Yeah.” I sighed. “T-minus sixteen hours…”

There was an interval of noiselessness that followed that sepulchral announcement, the only sound that of the city as it obliviously went on at its unending, hectic pace outside. Eventually, we shifted positions, ending up comfortably in a bit of a spoon. His arm, outstretched, reached beneath the arch of my neck, his other resting under mine, his hand warm and smooth on my abdomen. I could feel the soft pressure of his enervated manhood against the small of my back. One ankle was locked around my calf.

“Wally,” he murmured. 

“Hmm.” For all that I was overwrought with apprehension over what that evening would bring, and the ominous, dark cloud that loomed over the days following, I was maybe an inch from tottering off into Neverland. Something about Dick’s warm, solid bulk at my back, his form enveloping me in its secure, sheltering cocoon--I just felt fully, utterly _safe._ And… 

_Don’t say it, Wally, don’t break that down that final door, don’t do it--_

“So… I guess they weren’t wrong,” Dick said. “This is…” He trailed off momentarily. “It’s _real._ Isn’t it.”

I opened my eyes, and sighed. His hand played a bit on my skin, low on my stomach. I damn near purred at the feeling, for all that I struggled with a flustering sense of profound reticence unusual for me.

I had about forty things I wanted to say, but no real words for them--or at least, no words I dared give voice to. I vacillated, feeling as though I’d been lobbed in an industrial-sized washer and left to tumble dry--stumbling from the cycle days later nauseatingly dizzy, with no sense of direction, entirely powerless to regain my bearings.

Dick saved me the trouble. 

“Fuck, Wally,” he said, his voice low, husky. “I think…” He broke off for a tormenting moment. 

“What,” I whispered. 

_Goddammit, Dick, just say it… It’s not like we can deny it, anyway, just say it…_ I gritted my teeth, my heart hammering with anticipation. _If you won’t say it, I will, and we_ know _I’m not going to say it gracefully…_

The silence went on for an agonizing Martian life cycle.

“…I’m crazy about you,” he finally said.

…Close enough.

“Okay, you know what, let me try that again,” he said, expelling his voice in a huff. He drew his arm out from under me, propping himself up on his elbow. “Wally freaking West.”

“Dick freaking Grayson.” 

“I think… I think I love you.” He paused. “Okay. I don’t think. I know.” He heaved a sigh, then fell to his back. “…I love you.”

A stricture compressed my throat. So much for any sort of grace I might have anticipated from him, but for all that his profession was (adorably) awkward, it moved through my whole body like a beam of fucking sunshine--warming me all the way down to the nuclei of my cells.

“There. I said it,” he murmured. 

I turned to face him, and without hesitating, without worrying about Artemis or Babs, without thinking about the events on the impending horizon, without giving a damn about a single thing outside of that room, I folded my lips over his. Drawing back, too soon, not soon enough, I held his gaze in the lamplight, thumbing his cheek. 

“Hey,” I said. 

He inclined his head. 

“…I love you, too.”


	7. Act 7: Swords of Fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, all!! <3 
> 
> Well... As you can see...
> 
> This is not, after all, the final installment! :D
> 
> This last portion ended up getting WAY too long to be feasibly kept to one chapter, so I went ahead and decided to split it up into two parts. Providing I don't encounter a similar issue as I work to wrap things up, the next chapter should be the grand finale. <3 
> 
> (I'll level, though... I'm actually kind of relieved not to be done yet. <3 I'm really going to miss working on this story...) <3 :-( 
> 
> There are some MAJOR, CRITICAL, SERIOUSFACE conversations in this chapter... I've been chronically sleep-deprived over the past couple of weeks *eyes baby* so here's hoping I did them justice. <3
> 
> As for Jason--Weisman revealed he and Dick were close in this u-verse. <3
> 
> The "I'm a Bun" song is from Amazing World of Gumball. :D
> 
> Also hoping I did Mavra justice. It's been... Jeez, ten years since I read the DF books she was a major player in. O_O 
> 
> Enjoy, all. ^_^

I sputtered, gagging, the black water filling my lungs, bubbling into my throat, spurting over my chin. I tried vibrating my molecules, I tried a sacrifice throw, I attempted rotating my arms into a funnel. I was so fatigued I couldn’t do any of the above. 

I wound up hurled to my back on the shore, my skull jouncing against the rocks, my back bowing with a shock and then going hotly numb as I sprawled prone, the sky dancing a manic jig overhead. I caught my breath, choking on a brackish spume of river water that burst into the thick air in a grimy spray. 

A blade sheared my arm, pinning a swatch of my uniform sleeve into the ground, and a wash of deathly, sickening cold came over me in brazen defiance of the equatorial heat, my burning, water-clogged nostrils all at once overwhelmed with the livid stench of old, moldering earth and bloody, rotting meat. 

_Where the fuck is everybody--where--_

The androgynous figure, skeletal, desiccated, the skin flaking and withered, loomed over me, the sharp, preternaturally strong fingers clasping my face in a grip so tight it would have been more believable from a fucking car crusher. 

I struggled, reduced now to uncoordinated animal response, kicking madly and going all flying elbows, my speed fluctuating, almost entirely spent.

Mavra’s voice hissed into my ear, and I _swear_ I felt my soul go to dry ice at the sound.

“You’re tired,” she whispered. “Exhausted, even. Let go. Just _let go_. I do not require your soul. Merely your body. It will not prevent you moving on. Surely it’s peace you seek, like all mortals. _Let go.”_

I dimly heard something, some humming sound singing a ways off, as Mavra’s palm pressed a thick, wet, foul cloth over my nose and mouth. 

“Stop fighting,” she murmured. “ _Let go,_ just let go…”

_Oh, my God, I’m going to die here--not again--Artemis is going to kill me--and Dick--_

Tears sprang into my eyes, and for a bare moment, I _did_ start losing my grip, my body sinking into the grotesquely popping muck at the shoreline of the river.

_She’s weak by running water, why is she still so strong--_

_For fuck’s sake, help me--_

The events preceding this catastrophic moment spat in bursts through my guttering mind, intermittently between flash wonderings of how the hell this mission had managed to go south so fast. 

I had woken up late, my head swimming and muscles tired. I slid naked out of bed, and meandered sleepily over to the connected bathroom. I came in on Dick brushing his teeth, enveloped in the residual steam from the shower, a towel around his waist. 

“It’s alive,” he said, smiling through the toothbrush, then rinsing. I rubbed at the back of my neck, and gave him half a smile in return. Turning the shower back on, I stepped in, and got cleaned up. 

Coming back out after I raided the toiletries and brushed my teeth, I found Dick, still wrapped in the towel, seated by the window, where he nursed a cup of coffee and fiddled with his holographic computer. 

“How’s it going?” I asked, wandering over to the coffeemaker that stood in this little breakfast nook thing in the far corner of the room, indicating that this was Bruce’s favored spot to crash in when he stayed at the penthouse. I couldn’t help inwardly snickering at the thought that we had totally just decimated the place as I poured a cup. I inhaled the scent--ah, _heaven._ Thankfully, Dick liked his stuff strong, which was really the only way I got a buzz (however short-lived) from it. Unlike him, though, I took mine straight. 

“It’s going,” he said. “Just kind of touching base with Bats and finalizing things for later.”

“What’s the update?”

“Things look good so far,” he said, and rubbed at his forehead. “I don’t know how the hell they managed it in the time frame--other than the possibility that maybe Fox is actually a closeted wizard alongside those White Council people--but he and Bats got a pretty decent arsenal of anti-vamp weaponry put together overnight, and being who he is, Bruce also sent our teammates the game plan and a bunch of info to read up on before the briefing later.” He stretched. “Hoping for the best, preparing for the worst, you know the drill.”

“Let’s not consider what the worst might be,” I said. “I haven’t even started in on this coffee yet.”

He half-smiled. “Fair enough. We’ll just pretend that the worst case scenario in this situation is that Zatanna can’t mend my pants.”

I dropped my head to the table and laughed. “Oh, dude, I’m sorry.”

He quirked his lip, a little half-heartedly. “It’s okay.”

I felt a touch of misgiving, wondering at his sudden lack of enthusiasm. He looked like a six-year-old kid who had just discovered that Santa Claus wasn’t real. I frowned, and hazarded, “So… How are you… you know, _feeling?”_

He scrunched up his face, and ran a hand over his damp hair. “Uh… a bit sore. But it’s all good, man. I’ll just sit on an ice pack all day.”

I grimaced. “Again. Sorry.”

He shook his head. “Don’t be. Last night… might have been the last time we’ll really have together. I’m not about to regret anything that happened.”

I smiled, a little heartened. “Me, either.”

The feeling fell flat to the floor when he didn’t look over at me from where he sat, all but glaring at his cup of coffee. 

“Are you sure you’re okay, man?” I asked. “You look like you just found out Christmas was cancelled.”

He looked up at me, his face dark and troubled. “Yeah. Um… Do you know if Artemis said anything to Babs? About us?”

“Uh… well, no, but honestly, dude, if I know Artemis, I seriously doubt it,” I said. 

He sighed, and rubbed at his stubble. Damn, but he looked _exhausted_ \--stressed, browbeaten, wholly overcome. I frowned, studying him. 

“Dick,” I said, “what’s going on?”

“Just… take a look at this.”

He lifted his phone, thumbed the screen, and then handed it to me. 

The first text I saw was a message that Dick sent Babs the night before.

 _Love you, babe, take care of yourself <3 _

The next was dated that morning, incoming likely while I was showering, and came from Babs:

 _So I think some Real Talk needs to be had. Soon. Bruce said you’re occupado later but this needs to happen ASAP_

Sent:

_I can talk now, what’s up?_

Received:

_I want to SEE you and talk, not text about this_

Sent: 

_Okay, what’s ‘this?’_

Received:

_I’m onto you, Dick._

Sent:

_I oughtta be so lucky :P Care to clarify what you mean by onto me?_

Received:

_How long has this thing with you and Wally been going on--and don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. Do some thinking on how you want to answer that and we’ll Real Talk when you’re finished up later_

I handed the phone back to him, my heart sprinting in my chest, brows practically embedded in my hairline in my expression of horror.

“Oh, shit,” I told him, my heart, still thundering, sinking down into my gut. “ _Double_ shit. How would she have figured it out if she’s been gone?”

Dick sighed, and fiddled with his coffee cup. “Wally, she’s been back since Friday afternoon. Bruce just told me. Apparently the mission she was on wrapped up early.”

“Oh, no, dude.”

“Yeah. I can only _guess_ how she figured it out.”

I stared at him, my heart continuing to sink, coming closer and closer to falling out of my ass with each horrific suspicion that dawned on me.

“Oh, God,” Dick said, his hands visibly beginning to shake. “Wally, she’s going to murder me in my sleep. And dude, I totally deserve it-- _God,_ I’m such a piece of _shit--_ I cheated, I hid it, I lied--”

His phone buzzed on the surface of the table, startling both of us. I gave him a flustered look when he shoved it toward me. 

“I can’t bear to look,” he explained, and covered his face with his hand. “Wake me up when everything’s over.”

I sighed, and through my own nerves, gave his shoulder a squeeze before I checked the phone, my heart hammering somewhere near my uvula.

From Babs:

_Dick, I can’t lie, I’m hurt, I’m confused, and I REALLY wish that I could unsee what I saw. But I’m not like… going to murder you in your sleep or anything. In other words, you don’t need to be afraid to talk to me about it. I just want to know what’s going on._

I exhaled, and felt like just forking myself over to Mavra when I considered what Barbara might have seen--she’d gotten back Friday afternoon? What happened on Friday…

Oh. Sweet. Lord.

Cripes. A fall off a thirty-story building suddenly morphed into something of towering appeal. Babs was irrefutably the sister I never had--I had known her since I first became friends with Dick, back when I was… thirteen? We pretty much _grew up_ together. The idea that someone in my _sibling_ tier saw me in such a horrifically incommodious position-- 

_Ewwwww--ew-ew-ew, don’t think about it-don’t think about it--_

With an enormous effort, I pulled my shit together, thrusting that miserable thought from my mind.

“Well… it could have been worse,” I said, and handed the phone to him. “Maybe.”

He looked at the text, sighed, and thumped his head on the table. After a moment, he lifted up, and pressed his fingers into his temples. 

“Goddammit,” he muttered. “Guess that whole thing just got decided for me…”

He thumbed the screen of his phone, set it down.

“You know what, though,” he murmured, staring at his coffee. “…I’m kind of relieved, to tell you the truth.”

“How so?” I asked.

“Just that… I don’t have to hide this anymore, or even just fess up to her about it,” he said. “That I don’t need to start making my own funeral arrangements. Well. Not _yet,_ anyway.” He sighed. “Still… I can’t help but just feel so _terrible_ about the whole thing. The girls don’t even have the whole story--what’s going to happen when they do? And to that end, what the fuck are _we_ doing? And dude, how the hell are people going to _react_? I mean, Jesus, Wally--I already have a rep as the team bicycle and just a total whore in general, now I’m opening up to cock, too? They’re going to think I like, _stole_ you from Artemis and manipulated you into this whole thing, and now _no one’s_ safe from Dick Grayson’s actual dick!” Again, he thumped his forehead to the tabletop. “Don’t even get me started on Babs--she _said_ I wasn’t ready for her, multiple times, and doesn’t this kind of _prove_ it to her? She took a fucking gamble on me, Wally, and I _knew_ that, so I was totally determined to be the best damn boyfriend there ever was--like that valiant knight with the flowers and the white horse and all that cheesy crap--because… goddammit, I _love_ her, and contrary to popular belief, I _was_ ready to commit!” He dug his hands into his hair. “But now… Now what? What does _this_ tell her? God--that I _failed miserably,_ Wally, that’s what--that I’m still that horny teenager, sticking it in everything that moves.”

“Okay, man,” I said gently, lifting my hands. “I get what you’re saying. But listen, we may have picked on you for being a dog like, five years ago, but these days? You’ve been with Babs a while--successfully mutually exclusive, well, before Thursday, anyway--and it’s _not_ like you were out sticking your actual dick unbagged in everything with two legs and a fuckhole beforehand. Artemis and I actually talked about that once--you wouldn’t just vacuously flirt, like, you’d set your sight on someone, flirt with a definite endgame in mind, and pretty much unfailingly score that goal--and on that note, you’re a chode.” 

He reluctantly gave me a half-smile.

“But you’d always be really upfront with the girls you got with--they always knew where they stood, I mean, it’s not like there were any false pretenses,” I continued. “Plus, you always _knew_ who you were having sex with. So… I don’t know, maybe I think your rep is unfair, or worse in your own mind than it actually is.”

He was quiet for a moment, and then sat up.

“I can’t believe I haven’t actually talked to you about this,” he said. “Or anyone else, for that matter. But… About all that.” He eyed me. “Dude. Do you know what it was _like_ , living with Bruce?”

“I’ve got a pretty good idea,” I said. “I’ve known you guys a really long time, you know. I might come off as oblivious, but trust me--I pick up on things.”

He smiled. “I know you do. In other words, you’re well aware of what it was like to live with Bruce. That’s not to say… I mean, I love him, Wally, I really do, he’s the father that stepped up and was there for me after I lost mine, and he opened the door for me to what would become my life’s greatest purpose, but… man, he’s like the fucking Arctic Circle. I remember one time--literally _one time--_ that he actually hugged me. And that was right after I moved into the manor.”

I grimaced. “That’s rough. And worse, you’re an octopus and have pretty much no personal bubble. And were used to loving parents.”

“Nailed it,” he said. “I spent… how many years? Where being _smiled at_ was like, I don’t know, Christmas Morning. And by the time I hit, you know, _that age…_ God, Wally, I _needed_ it. I’m not like Bruce or Jason--I can’t go through my life just _starving_ like that. If _my_ ass is touch-deprived, I’m not going to just hang out and suffer with a bottle of Shiseido in the bathroom. And at the time, I wasn’t all that invested in finding a long term partner, you know? So… I just… took great pains to make sure no broken hearts got left in my wake--I mean, I’m not Ted Hughes, here--and got my rocks off without obtaining any legacies or leaving any little accidents running around and in so doing boosted latex stocks singlehanded across the globe. Everyone’s welcome.”

“I get it, Dick,” I said. “Seriously, I do. That aside, back in your dog days, man, thinking on it? Life _sucked_ for you. Like gargled two balls the size of small planets sucked. Jesus, I mean, Jason was _murdered_ , and then Tula pulled like, some Masayoshi move, and then, oh, let’s just chuck a fatass cherry on that suckfest sundae--all that shit with Rimbor and the Reach went down.” I shook my head. “Dude, you were _not_ in a good place. Bats was gone, Jason was gone, I was gone, Kaldur went undercover, and I wasn’t really on board with jack shit anything and was a total douchecanoe about it to boot.” I threw out a loud sigh. “Man. I’m sorry I wasn’t more… I don’t know. _There_ for you, I guess.” 

He shook his head. “We’ve been through this, Wally. You were right to be pissed.”

“Was I? You were still my best friend, who was under _way_ more pressure than any human being ever should be, let alone a grieving nineteen-year-old _kid--_ God, dude, you needed me.” I sighed. “You and Kaldur really did a ballsy-ass thing to hamstring the enemy that at this point, I actually really admire you both for. I mean, it took some serious _courage._ And I acknowledge now that Artemis really was the only natural choice in that equation. I mean, I guess you could have asked me, but my meta status could have jeopardized the whole operation, and I… probably would have said no, anyway, not to mention the fact that she’s way more capable than I am like, a hundred percent of the time. Meaning… Oh, yeah, it still would have defaulted to Artemis. Plus… she was a big girl and could make her own choices. I mean, she totally could have said no if she’d really wanted to. I _really_ shouldn’t have put it all on you.” I sighed. “I was wrong, and I’m sorry.”

He smiled at me, although he looked, to my regret, close to tears--not my intention with what I was telling him. Like me, he was never one to cry much, and he had a high threshold for it. But given the duration of our friendship, I’d seen him cry plenty, and just as I knew his rage cues, I knew his weeping cues, too. I readied myself for it. 

“It’s really okay, man,” he told me, his voice quiet, careful. “Like I said, we’ve been through this already. A lot. You know I’m sorry for everything that happened then, too. I was a total asshole.”

“Well, back to my original point, then,” I said. “You were really in a crap situation, Dick. And taking it from _all_ angles. And you were so… I don’t know, _alone._ And as you just said, _starving._ With regard to your being a slut, well… You pretty much said it. That you were… you know, you were comforting yourself. That you were way more _responsible_ about it than the average skeazy dude kind of absolves you of any _serious_ whore accusations.” I paused, and smiled. “But not of joshing ones. I still reserve the right to mess with you about it.”

Dick was quiet for a minute. 

“You know,” he said eventually, “that’s where Babs finally caved. When she brought up my bicycle status when we were talking over actually putting a title on things, I explained that I _needed_ to be touched. Like I needed it like I needed air and food and never-ending reruns of _The X-Files._ Single to me does _not_ mean you have to be chaste, and I couldn’t _stand_ that abstinence shit, anyway, dude. For reasons we just covered. Can’t exactly stay whelmed if I’m starving to death. Anyway… I just told Babs that having a steady girlfriend would actually probably be good for me. Like what I needed was probably stability.”

I leaned back in my seat. “Well, she obviously agreed. And she was always pretty chill about your womanizing exploits, anyway. I mean, she really stayed fairly unfazed by a lot of your hook-ups. I didn’t witness the two of you actually officializing things, but has she brought up your history since you guys got together?”

He shook his head. “Not really, no. Maybe once or twice, but mostly just kind of joking around.”

“See--there you have it. And this…” I broke off. 

“This?”

“Well. This is the penultimate of extenuating circumstances,” I said. “So… You’re really not a whore, Dick. Nowadays, definitely not. Seriously. _You are not a whore._ Say it with me--” and here he, smiling, grudgingly joined me in a first-person variant, “you are not a whore.” I smiled back, and reached over to grasp a lock of his hair. “Bottom line, dude… It’ll be okay. We’ll figure everything out. I mean… this whole thing really sucks for everyone involved, especially for the girls--I mean, it _really_ sucks--but honestly, this didn’t happen because you were out whoring around. You’re not a deviant, you’re not a manipulator, you just… had feelings you didn’t recognize, and wound up like, _force-_ whammied into acting on. And if Barbara’s going to default to your slutty history, then I hope she’s ready to level that accusation on me, too, because we _all_ know I used to hit on everything that wasn’t dead, and last I checked, in this situation? Pretty sure I made the first move, every time.”

He sat up.

“Wally, why the ever-loving fuck are you so good? I mean, what, did you get with Harry and have him give you some potion? Because if so, I don’t know, could you maybe get him to give _me_ one?” And then, to my abrupt dismay, he dissolved into full-on tears. “Fuck, fuck,” he said, squeezing his eyes shut, pressing his fingers into them, taking one enormous shuddering breath, “fuckity-fuck-fuck, pardon my sailor mouth, fuckity-fuck-fuck-fuck-fuckity-fuck…”

“Oh, shit, Dick, I didn’t mean to make you cry, here,” I said frantically.

He shook his head. “No, it’s not you, it’s just…” He breathed in, looked up at the ceiling, then smiled at me. “I just _really_ appreciate you saying all that. And… this weekend has just been a fucking train wreck.”

I rose, and walked over to him. 

“Come here,” I said. 

He didn’t--he sat fast and rigid, still clearly trying to stem the outflow. 

“I’ll be fine, dude, seriously. God, what a moron,” he said, with a hybrid sniff-chuckle sound. “Sorry.”

“Dick, come on. You saw me cry more in one day than I have in the past three years and you hugged _my_ ass afterward. And like you pretty much just said--this has been the single most fucked up weekend the world has ever known, okay?” 

He, again, did the sniff-snort-laugh noise, and then just caved in all at once. I pulled him to me, heedless of the fact that he was only in a towel. 

“And you’ve really gotten the brunt of it,” I went on. “You lost someone who was like family to you, to _murder,_ no less, by some slimy vampire Twat of Darkness, and that single craptastic event, as if it wasn’t quite bad enough, led to your entire _world_ just getting flipped completely on its ear in literally a matter of seconds. And now you’ve got problems-- _big_ ones--in Girlfriend Town. My girl at least was really sweet about this whole thing. Babs was… I mean, she _was_ pretty damn nice, all things considered, but I didn’t exactly hear her joking about four-ons like Artemis did, either. And now, we’re off to _fight_ said Mighty Twat of Darkness, and who the hell knows how _that’s_ going to turn out. Meanwhile, all of _this_ is going on--and doesn’t it sometimes take people, I don’t know, a _while_ to iron out revelations regarding their sexual identity? It’s a bit of a shock to hear oh, hey, you’re bi, and you’re in love with your best pal. Got girlfriends? Fuck yo girlfriends. This is _love,_ bitch.” 

He laugh-sobbed. I hugged him tighter. 

“It’s really too much,” I told him. “So if you need this, like I said the other day, I’m not going to judge. I think you’ve been enough of a butt-monkey this weekend to justify a good cry-fest, here.”

“You say that, and _you’re_ the one marked by some vampire skank with a chip on her shoulder named Harry Dresden,” Dick said wetly. 

“Yeah, but I’m not as worried about it as one might think,” I told him, drawing back and clasping his face in both of my hands. “I have you, remember?”

He smiled at me through his tears. “God, Wally, I love you, you know that?”

I leaned in, and kissed him, catching the hints of coffee and toothpaste, and didn’t bother to hit the brakes when things started picking up shortly after. 

A knock fell on the door. I drew back with tremendous hesitation, and heaved a sigh.

“Crap,” I said passionately, even as he gave me an expiatory smile. “Well, it’s just about go time, guess we couldn’t expect to get off beforehand.”

Dick laughed, and then squirmed disconsolately. I’d been working him through the towel and was maybe an inch from shucking the thing entirely. My boner was _way_ better concealed in my jeans than his beneath the linen, so I rose to get the door.

Zatanna stood at the entryway, brightly proffering Dick’s mended boxers and jeans, as well as a bag of bagels. 

“Sorry to interrupt,” she said, clearly fighting the urge to bust a gut at the sight of me, disheveled, obviously _interrupted._ “But… Dick asked earlier if I could fix these for him. So… Here they are. And here, have some noms to chew on with them. By the state they were in, I’m guessing you ripped them open with your teeth.”

I wormed my lip. “I’m not responsible for what conclusion you arrive at following your application of the scientific method.”

She snorted. “Well, only a few hours of peace remain, so… I suggest you guys capitalize. I can’t play mom for you guys anymore this weekend, since Harry and I are going to go get prepped on our end. You about ready for later?”

I considered that a moment.

“Ready enough,” I said decisively. 

“Good,” she said. “See you guys at Westward Bridge.”

*******

I stood nervously, fidgeting in my full-on Kid Flash garb, sweating in the dark, sultry air. Beyond where we stood was Westward Bridge, the landmark of where all of this began, and where it was all too likely to draw to an end. Nightwing was beside me, his Serious Face on, his arms crossed over his chest. If someone were to look at him as he was then, standing in his uniform, his broad shoulders squared under the armored padding, his jaw set in a Batman-esque deadpan, no one would ever suspect that he was a total screamer behind closed doors. The thought made my lip quirk in a bit of a smile. Thankfully, we _had_ been able to get off once more before go time--we’d jerked each other off simultaneously, with me straddling him and grinding into the hand that gripped his cock. I’d come fast, bellowing like a totally undignified lunatic, returning the favor from the night before of blowing it all over his bare chest. Dick followed suit with an equally loud shout not long after. 

This memory, pleasant as it might have been, was doubly awkward to chew on, though, given that apart from Tim, Jason (getting along surprisingly well with his more estranged Bat fam members), and Bruce, Barbara had randomly shown up. 

Before the little powwow began, she bypassed Dick where he talked with Batman, and came to stand by me, her arms crossed over her chest. I poured so much sweat that I’m shocked I didn’t make the river levels rise. I kind of nodded to her, my lips thinning, praying I’d still have a dick (in both senses of the term) in the next five seconds. 

“Yeah. We’ll talk,” she said, sensing my discomfort, although she gave me something of a smirkish half-smile that somewhat settled my frothing nerves. 

“I figured we would,” I said. “There’s, uh…” I laughed. “There’s a pretty fair deal to talk about.”

“That’s putting it mildly,” she said, smiling. “Look, though--it’s okay. Sort of. For the most part. I talked to A this morning about what I saw.”

…Good feelings gone. A bolt of humiliation and offense shot through me.

“Yeah, I know, I was meddling,” she said. “I just couldn’t sit on that info and live with myself. And with how things were going, it didn’t look like anyone was going to come clean about anything.”

“Hey, _I_ did,” I snapped, instantly pissed off. “Did you know that before you just dumped that load of sensitive info on my girlfriend?”

“I didn’t,” she said, getting huffy in return.

“Oh. That’s _great._ So you basically just ratted us out in such a way that could easily have made a seriously precarious situation even touchier. Look--I’m sorry about what you saw and everything that’s happened, but don’t start kicking your clumsy-ass feet around in _my_ life just because you’ve got Nightwing’s balls in such a death grip that he’d rather go radio silent than tell you the truth.”

“KF--”

“Just don’t,” I hissed. “ _God_ , BG, can I ask you what the blue hell you were smoking to think it was _your_ place to tell my girlfriend something like that? I mean, didn’t you stop to think,” in my fury, I adopted a sing-song voice, “‘oh, maybe that’s _his_ job, maybe I’m dumping a load of gas on a trash fire, here!’”

She lifted her hands. “Jeez, KF, chill out--I was just doing what I thought was right.”

I didn’t chill out. At all. 

“You know--you and Bats both are the single most annoying asshats on the face of the planet with the whole leveling thing,” I said hotly. “I love how you’ll keep critical _case and_ _mission_ info to yourselves, but with personal crap, you’re all too ready to just shove it in everyone’s faces like it’s your patriotic duty to spill or some shit.” 

“Like I said,” she told me, every bit as heatedly. “ _Chill out._ Yeah, I was insanely upset and hurt, but I wasn’t really _shocked,_ either. I mean, come on--I’ve known you both since we were kids. I think it’s safe to say I knew you guys totally had the capacity for this before either of _you_ did.”

I stared at her, spontaneously wordless. 

“I’ve known Nightwing’s at least had bi tendencies since like, the sixth grade,” she continued, gesturing madly. “And I was always kind of low-key aware of what your relationship with him really meant--at least on _his_ end. You know how often he’s shafted me to go do something with you or left me hanging because you needed him for something over the years? I’m not stupid, KF--trust me, I’d already pretty much pieced it together, not that doing so was hard. Finding him plowing you when I was supposed to be gone for the weekend was _not_ something I wanted to see--I mean, I’m pretty much scarred for life, not to mention you guys have totally broken my goddamn heart--but I definitely saw it coming.” She paused. “Literally.”

Well… She was joking. That had to be an… _okay_ sign. I unwound--slightly.

“Anyway,” she went on. “Talking to Artemis and hearing that you apparently were under some spell--I don’t know, the whole thing just seemed kind of hinky. So I did some digging, and after hearing there was, in fact, a pretty good deal of shit hitting the fan from Bats, I wound up talking to Thomas over there earlier this afternoon.”

“What did he tell you?”

She heaved a sigh, and shifted her weight.

“Well, he said that he was sorry, but that this particular spell backfired and just woke up feelings you guys already had for each other.” She paused. “Again. Not shocked.” Another beat, during which she chewed at her lip. She sighed, and continued, “But--you’ll be happy to know I haven’t talked to Artemis about _that_ part of things. You can deal with that.”

I nodded. “Thanks--I appreciate that.” I worked my jaw, and rubbed agitatedly at the back of my neck. “Look. I’m really, really sorry. About all this. I mean it. And I’m sorry for lashing out at you, here. This whole thing has been kind of rough on us, too, and… Not going to lie, I’m pretty embarrassed you came waltzing in on us. But… Look, B. Neither of us meant for this to happen.”

She shook her head. “It’s… not really your fault, KF. I know you and Nightwing would never _intentionally_ do anything to hurt me or Artemis.” She heaved another sigh. “Doesn’t mean it doesn’t totally suck.”

“Just so you know,” I said, “not that it’ll help--but we didn’t ask for any of this.”

“I know you didn’t. But… I can’t help feeling this whole thing was inevitable, magic or no.” 

She crossed her arms over her chest, tight around herself. Self-soothing. All at once, I felt fucking awful.

“Maybe a part of me even low-level shipped you guys and I’m just jealous, knowing that Nightwing will never love me like he loves you,” she said lowly, with a sigh.

“Oh, stop it, Babs,” I said, lapsing in an emotional moment into her civilian name, forgetting security. “He _worships_ you.” 

“Oh, KF, I know he loves me,” she said, smiling wanly. She looked disconcertingly close to tears. “But… To be honest… I’ve never really felt that I’m his Great Love.”

I frowned at her. “Why would you say that?”

“Come on. It’s painfully obvious I’ve never been like, the Morticia to his Gomez. When we _did_ put a title on things, I’d think here and there that maybe that feeling was wrong, maybe I _am_ his Big One after all, since he’s… Well, he’s just _him,_ Wally. He’s a total sweetheart. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him so much as raise his voice, outside of yelling at Batman. But…” She, again, sighed. “Seeing you, uh, _together_ , even though it’s not like I stuck around for the whole show… He _never…”_ Here, at last, she looked up, inhaling, and blinked her eyes rapidly behind her mask. “Okay. Let’s say a mouse farted while we were having sex. He’d totally have heard it _every time_ and looked around and been like ‘little motherfucker’s so rude,’ and _then_ gotten back to it. Neither of you even heard me just blatantly come in the front door and drop my keys on the counter.”

I quelled my mortification. “Would you believe me if I told you that he really tried fighting this?” I asked gently. “ _Because_ he loves you?”

She smiled at me. “Yeah, but I have to wonder how much of that was just him being him. He messed around with a lot of girls, but he was never unfaithful.” 

She paused, her very stance just _radiating_ miserable unhappiness. I reached over, and, all previous anger gone, laid an arm across her shoulders, my motions careful, uncertain if she wanted me to touch her. She took me aback when she leaned her head on my arm. 

“You know,” she said, “I kind of wonder if this is at least _partly_ why he philandered so much through his teens. General commitment phobia and fulfilling his needs without any baggage aside. He himself might not have been fully aware of it--but all the girls he was with, they weren’t intrinsically what he really wanted.”

“You mean… Like, he’s been closeted bi--as in, _deeply_ entrenched, like all the way back in Narnia closeted bi--but with a stronger propensity for men?”

She shook her head, still resting on my arm. “No, no. If anything, I think he’s more drawn to women. But… overall… I think it’s more that he has the strongest propensity for _you.”_

I felt simultaneously saddened and overjoyed by this assessment, the whole emotional war deeply overlaid with guilt.

“…I don’t know about that, B,” I said, my voice cumbersome, awkward. Nothing I could think of sounded like the right thing to say.

She sighed. “I do,” she said. “I mean… I think. God, Wally, when you disappeared, that _shattered_ him. I’d _never_ seen him like that. And haven’t since. He was _never_ the same until you showed back up.” She paused. “I just don’t really see him getting quite _that_ torn up about it if I were to disappear.”

“Girl, are you kidding,” I said forcefully. “He’d be a total wreck. I mean, like _lost cause_ total wreck.”

She gave me a smile. “Yeah, I don’t know, KF. …You didn’t see him.”

“Listen. Have you talked to Dick about this at all yet?” I asked, a little shocked by the uncharacteristic display of insecurity from the normally confident Barbara. 

Then again--she _had_ come in on her beau porking his best male friend. I guess that’s decent grounds for some insecurity.

She shook her head. “No, I only just got here and just kind of launched into it with you. He didn’t look real happy to see me here.”

“B, you really should. I think he’ll surprise you. He loves you _way_ more than you give him credit for.” 

She sighed. “Maybe. Guess we’ll see.”

“He’ll surprise you.”

I gave her shoulders a squeeze, and then glanced over at where Dick and Bruce stood side by side, talking in hushed voices with Murphy and Thomas, Nightwing’s ubiquitous holographic computer drawn up between them. 

“Does _he_ know?” I asked, keeping my voice low. “Bats, I mean? 

She half-smiled. “If you’re asking if I said anything to him, no. But I don’t think I’ll need to, either.”

I sighed miserably. “Ugh, I do _not_ want to deal with that part of things…”

“I doubt he’ll judge, KF,” Babs said. “He’d let Nightwing get away with murder--I mean, Red Hood is here because N wanted him in on this, and there’s Bats, not even breaking a sweat. And you _know_ he’s not a homophobe or anything. Last I checked, he flattened that one GL jackass for making a crack about Blue Beetle and your cousin on the field.” 

I nodded, and smiled. “Well… This is true. I witnessed that, actually, now you mention it.” I sighed happily. “Ah, that was satisfying.”

“If anything…” she said, nudging me with her elbow, “just prepare for a really strict dressing-down about not taking such a huge commitment and life change lightly.”

“Girl, I love you,” I said, and kissed her forehead. 

She smiled up at me. “I love you, too. Boyfriend-stealer.”

“I’m not…” I called as she walked away to stand by Dick, whose stance immediately went tense, but after they moved off and exchanged a handful of words peaceably enough, Barbara standing in front of him and clasping both of his hands, they hugged, and he smiled. Part of me rejoiced. The other part of me fretted. 

Ugh--speaking of _insecurity._ I can’t say I’d dealt with it on this massive a scale before. 

Harry, Thomas, and Murph took turns briefing the group on the necessary info. I was surprised to learn that Wonder Woman had dealt with her own share of the undead in her lifetime, and even more so to hear Thomas openly protest against Jason’s presence.

“Calm down, Thomas,” Dick snapped. “Tell me why you don’t want him here?”

“That kid’s been _resurrected._ Hasn’t he,” said Thomas.

Dick visibly stiffened. Jason crossed his arms, and tilted his head to crack his neck.

“What does that matter?” Jason said, the accustomed dangerous edge coming into his voice. I clenched my teeth and braced for it, all at once glad that Dick--the only person capable of talking him down from one of his epic rage-outs--was there. 

When Jason was alive the first time (ah, the messed up things we encounter in this life), I liked him a good deal--I really did. He was unbelievably bright, a fair hand in the kitchen (which I, without even needing to say so, especially appreciated), and a close ally in battle. But for all his virtues, he had his flaws--his abrupt, volatile, easily triggered mood shifts that all too often culminated in discomfiting displays of violent temper and impulsive behavior, to name the chief of those. And Jay, even from a young age--was _big._ He was _easily_ bigger than Dick when he died in his mid-teens--and now, in his early twenties, he was fucking _enormous._ By the time Dick hit age sixteen or so, he was no longer a tiny thing by any stretch of the imagination, but standing by Jason, he always looked dwarfed and juvenile. Even with my speed, I really wouldn’t want to piss the Red Hood off, even if only a skosh, and considering that Jason was _easily_ pissed, I was just always glad I had his big brother in my corner to cool him off before laying me out to dry and get dismembered in Crime Alley. He’s still the only person I consciously rein my mouth in around.

“Black Court vampires will be able to tell you were brought back--like they’ll _smell_ it on you,” said Thomas. “I can tell without you even telling me that you were resurrected. And trust me, that will not only _disgust_ the vampires of the Black Court, but drive them _totally insane_ with rage.”

“Why?” Jason said. 

“You think they _like_ the life they lead?” Thomas said. “You can’t even call what they have _life_ \--they can’t abide the sunlight, can’t live without going chupacabra on innocent, undeserving people, have to hide out in these fusty, airtight dens to avoid going up in smoke, fry at the sight of a token of faith, totally doesn’t matter _what_ it is, get weak at the knees around running water, can’t go near Mama DiSalvo’s without upchucking their blood bags, can’t deal with a nice, warm hearth fire, and definitely can’t go walking into a home without being beckoned inside first--no easy feat when you’re clearly a half-rotted, smelly corpse, I mean, _no one_ wants to be pals with you. Not to mention, all of that has been _forced_ on them. Meanwhile, here _you_ are, _alive--_ one hundred percent, straight-up alive. Healthy, red-blooded, and thriving to boot. After having _died._ They’ll see you and they’ll want to _spoil_ you. Don’t be shocked if they all fall on you en masse.”

Although Jason’s face was hidden behind his full-coverage helmet, I could read the minor amusement and irritation in his stance. 

“If that’s the case,” said Jason, “how about letting me deal with the Scourge, if there is one?”

“You couldn’t handle a Scourge on your own,” Harry said sternly.

“Watch me,” Jason growled. “Anyway, let me at least be the lure--if I’ve got some extra hands in my corner, I’m pretty sure I can handle myself with these things. And it’ll keep them off our major players while they take down the Big Bad.”

“That works, then,” said Bruce, causing more than one eyebrow to lift. “Change in strategy. I’ll take Wonder Woman, Batgirl, Aqualad, Miss Martian, Impulse, Blue Beetle, and Robin, and work with Red Hood to deal with the Scourge, should the occasion arise.”

“Odds are, it will,” Tariq interjected. “Providing Mavra responds to my invitation. Which I am very confident we will have no trouble with. Be warned--she comes not with thralls, but Renfields, only. Vastly more dangerous.”

“Nightwing, Murphy, Superboy, Wolf, Beast Boy, you work on these… _Renfields_ and Darkhounds, then,” said Batman. 

“And for the first time,” interjected Wonder Woman, “you _may_ kill a Renfield if it comes down to it. They are effectively dead--and unlike the vampires, have no sentient consciousness. And equally unlike thralls, they cannot be brought back to themselves. Even the original Merlin and saints were incapable of restoring Renfields. Death for these creatures is a long overdue mercy, not a travesty. In fact, I would _encourage_ it.”

I shifted uncomfortably. This was getting heavy. 

I wondered, though, if someone like M’gann could restore a Renfield--according to Bob, an especially overpowered thrall of a Black Court vampire, crushed into submission through brute psychic force. I doubted any of the White Council or vampire Courts had encountered a Martian, and in particular one with M’gann’s enormous psychic capabilities. 

She surprised me when she spoke up, and offered to try. A murmuring broke out.

“If any Renfields are detained, attempts can be made,” Wonder Woman said after some quiet deliberation. “However, if they are out of hand, do not hesitate to put them down. The level of deranged violence these Renfields exhibit is… rather unprecedented.”

I noticed that Dick visibly relaxed, as did the others in his squad. Killing just doesn’t come naturally to our type--even in battle. We train rigorously _against_ deadly force. And if it comes down to kill or be killed, it’s a rare Leaguer that won’t opt for the latter--no matter how justified the former might be at a given time.

“Flash, Kid Flash, Zatanna, Dresden, Tariq, your job, obviously, is Mavra. Weaken, and bind her. From there, Dresden will handle her according to how the Council and Courts see fit. Should we find ourselves dealing also with Klarion, Harry, Zatanna--break off and see that he’s dealt with. Promptly.”

Harry nodded, and whirled his staff in a showy little circle. “Can do, gumshoe.”

I snickered. He’d been staring awestruck at Bats the whole briefing.

“To begin, Kid Flash, it’s your job, along with Tariq’s, to draw Mavra out,” said Batman. “At which point, once she has appeared, you will fall back and combine forces with your squad. Lead them back here, to Westward Bridge. Since Mavra apparently comes with her own muscle, the squads will then split apart and work on their designated targets. As for civilians, I’ve had Commissioner Gordon cordon off a wide area around the bridge and river to minimize innocent bystanders or other collateral damage. Questions?” 

After clarifications, further discussion, and weapons dispersal wrapped up, I surreptitiously squeezed Nightwing’s gloved hand before I left to get in position, and fell into step with Tariq as we made our way up the rocky embankment to the elevated walkway that wound alongside the river. 

“How are we drawing Mavra out?” I asked. “Are you doing that… Name spell?”

“I can,” said Tariq. “I have the means necessary. However, she _has_ marked you, and here you are, back on her present turf. Sources have informed me that she was out seeking you only last night. It was lucky that you resided in Wayne’s penthouse, beyond a threshold that she could not cross, coupled with Dresden’s and Zatara’s protective spells. Perhaps it would be best to allow her to think she has the upper hand, arriving to catch you unawares of her own accord.”

“So… I’m supposed to be bait?”

“Yes,” Tariq said humorlessly. “Be bait. However you feel bait would behave.”

I drew in a breath, my heart starting to generate some serious nervous speed in my chest. 

“Phew… Okay,” I said. 

“The night grows dark,” said Tariq. “Mavra’s time is upon us. Do what you must. If she fails to appear, I will summon her.”

“Hopefully she didn’t hear any of this illuminating conversation,” I muttered, and moved a little ways ahead of Tariq, into the unlit stretch of chewed-up sidewalk next to the scabby remains of an abandoned building. I looked over my shoulder, and saw that Tariq was nowhere to be seen. He just left me alone? To deal with a goddamn vampire and her OP, messed up army? I stifled the horrible sense of terrified panic that rose up in my chest, strangulating my lungs and kickstarting my heart, breathing in and out, as I’d learned to in training and experience over the years. 

“What the fuck,” I muttered, and then made my increasingly nervous way up the sidewalk. If I had to guess, while Mavra was busy confronting me, he planned to sneak up on her. Fair enough.

 _So… How does vampire bait behave…_ I wondered, and then busted into a skip and a couple of box-kicks. 

“I’m a bun, I’m a bun, I’m a tasty, tasty bun, to be baked and kneaded, oh, how fun…” I sang into the humid, darkening air, popping into a sped up version of a single buffalo tap dance step. 

Silence. Not even crickets or birds. The hair rose up on the back of my neck even as sweat trickled down my back like scrabbling insects. 

“You can have me with breakfast, have me with brunch…” I continued, skipping along, “you can have me with your dinner, you can have me with your lunch!” 

I rolled into a cartwheel--a good enough one that I knew Dick would be impressed--and kept singing. 

“Oh, Maaaavra… I’m a bun, I’m a bun--”

I broke off into an entirely undignified, startled squeak when I came face-to-face with what _had_ to be a Renfield. 

It’s been said that even if you’ve never encountered a rabid animal, you _know_ one when you see one, entirely on instinct, and you’ll never forget the sight. Same goes, it turns out, for a Renfield.

The guy… _looked_ human, but his face was grotesquely twisted, bestially enraged, pocked and bleeding with what looked, honest to God, like meth sores, his teeth cracked and sharp and bared over his bloody, ragged lower lip. Whoever this guy had once been, he _had_ to have been a world-class bodybuilder who won the last ten Arnold Strongman Classics consecutively, or at the least, a totally ’roided out meathead who bunked at the gym. His clothes were torn, sweat-stained, the pants caked in shit. I about fell on my ass in my shock. 

Another shape wandered over to stand beside him, canine, every bit as burly as its semi-human counterpart, covered in matted, tatty black fur, its teeth curved and and jagged beneath its peeled muzzle. A Darkhound. 

Crap.

I turned, and about plowed right into the gruesome, filmy-eyed, hag-like face that had haunted my dreams over the last several nights. 

Mavra. 

She stood, thin and sexless in light, well-fitting armor, her bony, withered shoulders hunched over the doublet, her hair, greasy and long in places, cracked off in short, dried, straw-like bits around her skull in others, all of it the color of black mold. Her skin was split and broken over her cheeks and forehead, old, desiccated blood gaping drab maroon beneath the desquamating flesh. For being several hundred years old, I assumed she’d look like death warmed up--but damn, she looked like death gone cold. A hideous, peeling smile broke out over her rotting teeth--reminiscent of gross chunks of burnt Swiss cheese between her flaking lips. 

More Renfields appeared around her, accompanied by more Darkhounds, all of them large, muscular, each more terrifying and tragically uncared for than the last. A sickening, overwhelming cold soaked into my form, contrarian against the heat of early July, even dissolving my own speedster-generated warmth. Hissing, whistling sounds, like reedy breaths and scraping leaves, echoed off of the walls of the buildings around me, and I saw them--the vampires--all materializing in the shadows. 

“Little speedster,” Mavra said in her dry, grating voice. “Kid Flash, as I hear you like to be called--and oh, such a _cute_ sacrificial lamb.”

I quirked my lip, and shrugged, taking note of Tariq, shifting in the shadows, sneaking around the growing army of undead creepers. 

“I don’t know, my girlfriend thinks I’m cute,” I snarked. “But sacrifice I kind of leave to Jesus. See ya on the flip!”

I spun, and, as directed earlier, raced back to the bridge, making it there in maybe a second tops, shuffling to a halt in a breaker of muck and rocks at Barry’s side. Tariq should have been able to jump Mavra, I figured. I straightened, brushed myself off, and then turned and jumped when I heard my uncle’s exclamation of surprise. 

Mavra was _right there._ Meaning--that bitch had some speed on her, too. Not at my level, but close enough that it significantly evened the playing field, in that I couldn’t just dance circles around her. Then again, Harry had described her capability of movement to me as “a blur.” But for all that she might have been fast by non-meta standards--I had _no_ idea she’d be dogging my heels quite this closely. 

Well. That certainly altered things. I was nervous before--I was properly terrified now. And where the _hell_ was Tariq all of a sudden?

Barry squared his shoulders beside me, a grin breaking brashly out across his features under his mask. 

“Can’t say I’ve met a vampire before,” he said cheerfully. “Didn’t even think they actually existed! But given we work daily with aliens and sorcerers, guess I’d better learn not to dismiss the possibility, am I right?”

Mavra, ignoring him, cast a glance over the sprawled out squads, every last member braced, weapons brandished, as the Scourge and Renfields with their Darkhounds corporealized from the darkness behind her, scuttling toward the bridge. Harry, again, swung his staff in a circle, and waved with a grin. I was gratified to see her stiffen momentarily, clearly not expecting to see the very adversary she was attempting to acquire power-ups to confront. She reanchored, huffed something of a wry, thready snicker, and turned her glance to me. 

“Ah. You and Dresden must be onto me, then. And thought to lure me into an ambush,” she said, and smiled--without a shred of emotion, absolutely no feeling behind the expression. The image was positively nauseating. “I did not keep ahead of the persecution of my kin by failing to remain one step ahead of my enemies. You fools.”

The sound of a familiar cackle resounded through the air, followed by something in the vein of a shaft of lightning. My pounding heart sank. Damn--yep, there he was, settling onto the ground in front of Mavra, with his familiar in his arms. _Klarion._ Beside him, Tariq’s shape descended, magic bonds lassoed about his struggling form, his mouth gagged beneath a supernatural glow.

_Damn._

“Finally,” Klarion said in his rasping, abrasive voice, perpetually one step under breaking, always an aggravating cadence. “Mavra, why don’t we make good on our deal now… Please? The more I see of your Scourge, the more I want to play…” He delightedly clapped his hands, Teekl crawling atop his shoulder. His eyes went vermillion, his face lapidarian, demonic. “Come on, _let’s play.”_

“We’ll play, Child of Chaos--” Mavra assured him in her dusty voice. 

“Lord of Chaos,” Klarion corrected her, his voice coming out in miffed tones.

Mavra continued, unruffled. “But first things first.”

I started and leapt aside when Mavra, with bullet speed, lurched toward me, fast enough that she nearly got her knobby, skinning fingers on my wrist as I pumped my arm to bound into a sprint. The noisome, awful, permeating cold she exuded washed over me, shocking me to my core, stalling my velocity. I stumbled over my own feet or thin air or God knows what. The stink she emitted assaulted my nostrils. I jumped when I saw her scramble over me, her motions arachnoid and lightning fast--not figuratively speaking on that one, either. I twisted away from her clawing grip, vibrating my molecules to keep her from getting a real grasp on me, and took off at top speed. I stayed near the battle site--if I led her out as far as my celerity permitted, I knew that I ran the risk of stranding myself out of the reach of my allies, a common danger for speedsters. I raced back and forth, in circles, in figure eights, and in serpentines across the combat zone, with the intention of possibly wearing Mavra’s old, dried-up ass out as she moved either to give chase or head me off. It wasn’t unlike a talented civilian athlete chasing an Olympian--not a _close_ race, per se, but she didn’t lag so far behind that her presence wasn’t felt, or a real problem. Occasionally, she applied other methods of trapping me, be those laying down a sheet of ice over the shoreline (which unfortunately wiped out a couple of my own allies, as well as a few of her own), and then creating some sort of mini earthquake that left me without purchase as I ran, sending me skirting over the ground, bouncing on my front and somersaulting into a haphazard pile by a tree. I rolled to my back, and jumped up to race off when she appeared over me, again with her astonishing alacrity. 

Everything seemed to be unfolding according to plan, though, for the most part--minus the fact that, with Harry and Zatanna doing some sort of weird, magic to and fro with Klarion, and Barry roped unanticipated into dealing with the Scourge of vampires, I was unexpectedly going toe-to-toe with Mavra by myself. Still--if I could run her around long enough to drop her old ass on its rotten face, no problem. Harry would likely be through with Klarion by then, and we could bomb her with vampire-themed Bat toys and string her up to dry.

There _was_ one tiny problem. My strength was starting to deplete--fast. Between the bizarre sense of frozen, bitter, choking cold that Mavra gave off, her overwhelmingly powerful stench that threatened to make me toss my cookies at any second, the storms of magic she threw in my path, and the fact that although she wasn’t quite as fast as I was, _the bitch was totally keeping pace with me,_ I found that _I_ was tiring--and quickly. 

I skidded to a halt, skimming over the half-melted surface of the ice Mavra had paved the sand of the shoreline with, and bumped into Jaime, just as he rose into the air, leveling his cannon on a Darkhound when it leapt at me from behind. I shouted a thank you, starting a bit when Superboy body-checked Mavra’s skeletal, dusty form before she could nab me while I tried to refuel and keep ahead of my adversary, wolfing in one swallow one of the energy bars I held in a compartment attached to my glove on the fly. For Conner’s effort, it earned him a powerful backhand--Mavra responded to his action with a spontaneity and speed that surprised even us quick-moving metas. She diffused into thin air--just disappearing, and with such suddenness that I almost couldn’t follow the loss of her form in the muggy darkness. Then she reappeared behind him, spoke, and flattened him with a force I couldn’t see--something like M’gann’s telekinesis. As I zoomed to help him, I missed the fresh ice that she littered over the bank, and I, again, lost my footing to slam to my front and skid over the rime, crashing into Robin, toppling him and sending us both skirting into the shallows of the river. We helped each other up, bodies bogged down with the weight of the grimy water, heavy with sediment. Looking about, I caught sight of Conner, rising none the worse for wear to his feet, and then reentering the fray. 

“You okay, KF?” Robin said. 

“Bitch is like undead Quicksilver,” I gasped out, my side stitching painfully, my heart palpating. “I’m like a jalopy trying to outrace the fucking Delorean. A Delorean coughing ice all over the damn road.” 

“Can’t be faster than you,” he said with a grin, readying his bo staff as a Renfield caught sight of him and started loping in our direction. 

“Not faster, but I’m definitely thinking more endurance,” I hissed, and then groaned in trepidation. “And _now_ where in Sam Hill did she go…? Crap…”

“Keep an eye out,” Robin called, and jumped into it head-on with the Renfield. 

I moved out of the foul water, grounding myself, concentrating and calming my breathing, and moving between moments to catch sight of my enemy. She was nowhere to be found amid the pandemonium of battle that ravaged the shoreline. The Scourge had, as Thomas warned, descended en masse in a collective fury on Jason, all of them shrieking in blatant, bone-chilling rage. The sound of detonating smoke grenades and incendiary Bat toys punctuated the eerie discordance, as flashes of erupting daylight flared in scaled-down mushroom clouds, the screams of the vampires crescendoing into ear-shattering, siren-pitched wails. Mingling with the stench of charnel house, I caught the scent of garlic. Some ways off, I could hear the voices of Harry, Zatanna, and Klarion, duking it out magically near the bridge. I couldn’t see through the smoke and turmoil to determine who had the upper hand--but Klarion’s frustrated tone hearteningly indicated that my allies comfortably held it. 

Intently, single-mindedly focused as I was on seeking Mavra, who was still a wisp of unseen air, wherever she was, I didn’t take notice of the Renfield that barreled up behind me, and clobbered me profoundly over the back of the head. 

I pitched to my obverse atop the melting ice on the riverbank, and after a breath of bewilderment, I twisted to my back. Through the fireworks that blotted my vision, the Renfield’s big, bloody fist came arching toward my face. Obviously, the strike moved at a normal, non-meta rate, but I was stunned enough that I wound up stuck in time for a moment--and in my disorientation, I took a really decent headshot from the big, brutish, former meathead. 

(Yes. Embarrassing. But it happens.)

My head pop-squeezed against the ground, my teeth bouncing together, my cheek splitting and instantly ballooning under my damaged mask, blood fanning from my mouth. I’d bitten my tongue. My skull went sandbag heavy, and even with my heightened reflexes, the world lagged into a sluggish and confused passage around me. The healing process for me might be accelerated, but not so much that I’m not subject to getting completely laid out right in the thick of things if someone times an attack just right and _really_ gets a good blow in. And there I was, only just coming to myself enough to jerk sideways as that big fist fell again, avoiding what would be the third strike (and probably my out.) 

Through the overpowering ringing between my ears, I heard the zipping whine of a wire, and caught sight of Nightwing as he scrambled deftly atop the Renfield’s broad, muscular shoulders, bracing himself with his knees locked over either flank of the brute’s trapezius muscles. With swift, adroit motions, Dick swept the length of line around my attacker’s thick, straining neck, and hauling up with all of his strength, yanked back on the wire, garroting the Renfield with a terrifying, lethal efficiency. The enormous form rocked backward underneath him, swinging long, burly arms, yanking at Nightwing’s deadlocked knees, all to no avail--Dick clung to him like a pitbull, unrelenting and undaunted even in the face of a larger enemy. I rose, determined to lend an assist, my jostled brain settling in my skull.

Flitting at my hectic pace, I jabbed the backs of the Renfield’s patellas, bringing the ogre to its knees, and then came up behind Dick, lending my strength to his as he pulled back on the wire, his muscles straining beneath his suit. The beast under us thrashed and fought, and we both pulled only harder, waiting for the I-Was-Once-a-Man to pass out from oxygen debt.

“I can think of a lot of things I’d rather be doing in this position,” I hollered over the commotion around us, “and some things I can totally see myself letting you do to me with that wire.”

“Dude, we’d better have a kink talk, then,” he yelled, cracking a smile even through his furrowed brow. “But keep it quiet, my girlfriend’s like, five feet away!”

“Wizard, bitches! Let’s bring this big guy down first--”

I squawked in astonishment and fought wildly when Mavra’s hands in a blink materialized and closed with supernatural strength over my upper arms, dragging me unexpectedly away from Dick with that inhuman power, trapping me in place, the sickening cold and suffocating stench stilling my molecules and lowering me prostrate. I struggled against her, my speed stuttering beneath that bilious, paranormal ague, hearing her whisper words that abruptly siphoned every drop of strength from my muscles--no idea what spell she cast, exactly, but I ended up exhausted, frail, powerless in her grasp. The ring Harry had given me earlier to absorb spells leveled in my direction must have hit its brimming point. Dick’s grip on the wire slackened as he turned, alarm flickering over his features. I screeched in a helpless, impotent panic when the Renfield finally caught hold of Nightwing in his lapse with one giant, pocked, bleeding hand closing on his calf, the other on his wrist, and tore his smaller body from its shoulders. Then, in two rapid, scary-smooth motions, the Renfield slammed Dick’s form into the rocky embankment, and then bodily hurled him headlong into a low-hanging girder that lined the underside of the walkway above. I _saw_ his face connect square with the metal ingot, heard a distinct, heart-stopping _snap_ that silenced his startled yell _,_ and saw his body tumble into the river, belly down. At a rate nearly incomprehensible even for me, dozens of thoughts jumped through my skull, screaming--

_His face had to have caved in, or it’s torn off, his skull is halfway embedded in his brain--_

_His neck broke, I heard it, he’s crippled, he’s dead--_

_I couldn’t fucking help--I just sat here--magic drugged or whatever this is--_

I. Fucking. Lost it.

Heedless of the weakness under whatever spell Mavra had cast on me, I tooth and nail fought that sudden, imposed frailty, the ire in my middle blazing into such an outward brilliance that even _she_ paused under it as I reeled through the languor to face her. 

I full-bodied threw myself at her, sobbing in fury, plowing through the leaden, weighted fatigue, dropping desperate, angry blows on her peeling face, dislodging bits of her rotting teeth. I went flat to my face when she caught my hands in hers, feeble under her power, and flipped me onto the ground. I cast about for some sense of balance from where I lay on my back, finding none. Dimly, I saw Murphy--she had yanked Dick from the water, although I couldn’t discern what condition he was in, given that she hunched over him, blocking my view. I wrangled with Mavra’s grip, attempting vainly to free myself, and then froze in horror when she, with some indiscernible, spoken words, opened something like a _hole_ in the air--beyond which lay an indeterminate blackness, heat yawning from it, as though it were the gaping mouth of an indolent dragon. I didn’t even get to blink when she lobbed me through that rift like I were a sack of groceries.

I tumbled into tossing water, briny and bitter, chucking me unceremoniously about until it dumped me on a muddy embankment. Emasculated, I crawled weakly on my hands and knees away from the muck, until I found myself at the maw of a moss-choked, covered bridge, beyond which stretched what looked like an uneven, tree-lined, mist-laden path. Looking up, seeing the trail winding from either side of the bridge swallowed in fog, the shadows thick, oily, and roving in the vapor, my heart banged with mounting speed and I fell to my seat. I kept deathly still, assessing my surroundings--all gray-scale, all wooded, all deathly, starkly silent. Hot. Muffled in fog. Other than the mist, no movement, not even a puff of wind. I had no idea what caused the fog to meander in its interested, questing motions. The darkness beneath the roof of the bridge all but shifted, moving as though alive. Fear of a different kind overtook me--something instinctive, whispering, setting my skin awash in gooseflesh. 

_It’s just the mist,_ I thought, _it’s just the mist making it look like there’s movement in there… It’s not the Headless Horseman, Wally, don’t panic…_

I rose, looking left and right, breathing heavily in my permeating, preternatural exhaustion, and blinked. Where was everyone, and more importantly, where the hell was I? It reminded me profoundly of Savannah, Georgia after nightfall, of all places--all dangling Spanish moss, questing brume, oppressive humidity, and the pervasive, intuitive, hair-prickling feeling of the supernatural. I took a couple of tentative steps, kind of edging back toward the water, the return of its sound comforting in the otherwise dead quiet. I _tried_ not to think of the Upside Down, and worse, the Demogorgon, stalking me from the cover of the trees. I stepped slowly, quietly, casting glances to either side, behind me, ahead. 

_Please don’t tell me I’m trapped in some alternate dimension again… Please don’t let this be like the Speed Force…_

I zipped to the shore of the water, my heart shuddering in my chest, my breath harsh and burning past my throat. An icy, crushing dread plunged over me.

_Oh, God--Am I dead--How do I get back to Gotham--Can’t be trapped again--Please tell me I’m not trapped again--Not here--Not wherever this place is--_

And then, Mavra came up behind me, suffocating me with her familiar gelid, revolting aura. She pressed a bony arm over my throat, and thrust me facedown into the rushing water, blackening my sight. Whipping me to back, she braced a knife blade over me, her lips pulling back over her moldering teeth in a repugnant, victorious grin. 

I eyed the blade of the knife, my speed plummeting as I wrestled against her superhuman strength, my muscles gone liquid and heavy. 

“And now,” Mavra murmured, “your body. Your body will be my vessel, little speedster. Your strengths, mine. Your abilities, mine. Your health, mine. My weaknesses… no more. Don’t fight me, young one. _Let go._ Move on. Seek your peace. _Let go.”_

I struggled, inhaling lungfuls of foaming water. 

“ _Let. Go.”_

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shout-out to Mangaluva and Isis_the_Sphinx. <3 :-)


	8. Act 8: The Cherubim

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, all! <3 
> 
> Ahhhhh, it's the last chapter, it's the last chapter!! <3 XD I'm really going to miss working on this story... :-( 
> 
> I do so hope that you enjoy this last installment. <3 Thank you all so much for seeing this through with me--and I hope you had as much fun reading as I did writing. ^_^ <3 
> 
> MUCH LOVE TO ALL! <3 ^_^
> 
> Xoxoxoxoxo  
> ~EF <3 ^_^

So there’s a lot that goes through your head when you’re about to die. 

Your life passes before your eyes, for one. In my case, both times, it was a panorama of images, all laid out in stark, bittersweet clarity, some of them good, some of them bad. 

You definitely, definitely think of your loved ones. 

In those moments that I watched myself go transparent, experiencing the profound dismay at seeing my hand as it evanesced into the whirring whites and blues and grays surrounding me and losing the sense of the ground beneath my feet--helpless beneath the feeling of my body separating atom by atom and flying away, my last impression before I whirled upward, overtaken and riven to dust by the rushing, overwhelming _power_ pulsing in and out of my ceasing form, was tremendous sorrow--and overpowering regret. 

I bequeathed my dying words to my uncle--and realized in sickening despair, as my body just swirled away even as I winced powerlessly against the force that overtook me, I didn’t get to ask Barry to tell Dick I was sorry. That I forgave him.

I can’t say I remember much about the Speed Force itself--just a feeling of being separated and incorporeal, of my incohesive pieces crashing through a wild current, completely impotent within the tumult. Succumbing to despair, to hope, and then despair, and finally hope again. An endless, immotile interment of complacency. And then, after this undetermined time of no authentic, lasting images forming in my sight, only a blur of colorless hues and a ceaseless roaring, indistinct din, I witnessed a figure, humanoid, faceless, darker than black, flitting in and out of my field of vision. That was the moment that I wakened somewhat, solidifying, planting the balls of my feet, and trying to _reach_ that figure--on the prayer that maybe I wasn’t alone in this strange, rushing void, that maybe I could find help, a release from this purgatory. 

I chased that shape, _reached_ for it, pumped my flickering, wavering, tralucent legs, inflated my immaterial lungs with the false, lacking air. I kept on in that way, moving without progressing in a dream-like stasis, losing that black figure, finding it again, time after time after time.

Then, there was the feeling of anchoring, the sense of structuring, of rising, and then, the image of my hand, bare, outstretched, _solid and real,_ reaching for that figure--

The monochromatic color wheel swiftly rolled, turned, shifted, parted, and I was sprinting full-tilt--twice around the circumference of the earth, not even recognizing that I had covered so much ground, the momentum too great for me to comprehend or stem, before I hauled up and took nearly seven hundred miles to skid to a halt, landing on my face in Morocco. Butt-ass fucking naked, I passed out promptly thereafter. 

What I didn’t realize, as my being dispersed into that kinesis, and I raced and moved and fought and reanchored, finally reclaiming myself, was that I _mastered_ the Speed Force. Even Barry and Bart often are hard-pressed to touch me now.

Superman, having been on duty in the Watchtower and taking note of the unusual energy activity in the Arctic Circle, came to investigate--and apparently had chased me on my twice-around-the-world track workout, catching up to me only when I zoomed to my ungraceful, discomposing stop. Three years after I’d swirled away into nothingness.

I got a second chance. 

This time, though, this time--

I thrashed feebly under Mavra’s bony, impossibly strong hand, my lungs bloating in my chest, my head pulsing sharply, inflating into a straining, stretching balloon about forty sizes too big, prickling hot and seconds from bursting. I pistoned my legs, the muck gripping them jealously, rendering my struggles useless. I tried twisting my neck to pry my face away from the wet, smothering cloth, but Mavra held me fast. 

Worse, I heard Klarion’s grating voice, echoing eerily around us, invoking magic that whirled like funnels of electricity throughout the stifling air. We seemed to be the only ones in this strange place. And from what I was picking up, Mavra wasn’t just going to take my blood for my attributes--she was going to take my goddamn _body,_ pump it full of blood magic, and then just straight up inhabit it, with Klarion as her tether to either side. God--what would that mean for my loved ones, for the _world?_ An embittered, raging, wicked-clever dark goddess-slash-vampire, inside the body and likeness of Kid Flash, with all of his strengths and more, out for blood--and no longer merely because she needed it to survive.

Again, thoughts of my parents twinkled into my flickering consciousness as it went spotty and surreal, when was the last time I visited them, why didn’t I visit more, how appallingly _unfair_ this was to them. Losing a kid once was unfathomable enough--losing that child _twice_ just was pointlessly cruel. Artemis, too, not only would endure that same pain two times over, losing everything we’d built together all over again, but this time, she’d be robbed of the truth I owed her, as well--she would, in time, come to learn the _real_ nature of my feelings for Dick--and I would be gone without ever getting to explain, to tell her just how much I loved her regardless, what she truly meant to me. 

And I was brought to the one who, once again, was my last thought before the darkness started pulling at the edges of my awareness. 

Tears unrelated to the oxygen deprivation under Mavra’s hold filled my eyes and poured onto the cloth she worked to smother me with, and my resolve faltered, my body slackening. I didn’t know if Dick was even alive--I _saw_ his fucking head snap back under that girder and I was fairly sure I witnessed an alarming spray of blood follow. Murphy had gone and retrieved him from the river, so at least he didn’t get swept away to drown, but for all I knew, he was dead before he even hit the water. 

My eyes fell shut. I no longer registered the lack of oxygen in my lungs, my limbs gone numb and dead against the muddy ground. 

_Don’t let go, don’t give in--_

That terrible _snap_ filled my ears, and my body devitalized in the silt. 

_Don’t…_

My left hand twitched. 

Then, my chest jumped and exploded in a desperate, reflexive, influx of air, blasting into my lungs all at once when the pressure was torn from my face in a cacophony of deafening sound. I gasped and retched, my throat gone to splinters, heaving in a crazed bid to make up the deficit of oxygen, my senses dazzled by an overpowering sunburst of white, blinding light that pulverized me underneath it the second my eyes dared pop open. Mavra’s voice screeched in an agonized, panicked hiss that echoed in the dense air. The sound of a scuffle followed, shifting away, and I gagged on river water as it barreled up from my lungs, coughing, sputtering, seconds from losing my grip on consciousness.

And then, I heard the single dearest sound--

“Breathe, KF, you’re okay, just _breathe--”_

Even as I raggedly hauled in breaths that tore at my pharynx and threatened to dislodge my tonsils, at the sound of Dick’s voice I sobbed in relief--which, of course, aggravated the gasping and heaving. Opening my eyes, my vision blurred and spotted with dancing lights, I _saw_ him, hovering over me, the sight confirming it _was_ him I heard. I couldn’t see well enough through the disco party light show playing across my line of sight to determine what condition he was in, as his face, shadowed and flickering, wavered in and out of focus. I gulped air into my lungs, jawing fitfully. His hands, strong and assured, turned me to my side. “In, out. Slow down. You’re okay.”

Eventually, through the swimming, fuzzing vertigo, I felt those hands in my armpits as they boosted me up, and then, tugging gently, encouraged my arms over my head. 

“In, out… You’re okay, KF--”

I didn’t let him finish that thought, dropping my arms to fling them around his shoulders, even as a faceless battle noisily raged around us. He in turn gripped me lariat-tight, and I pressed my face dizzily into the crook of his neck. His fingers squeezed a handful of my hair, and I pulled away, grasping either side of his face. He winced a little at my touch.

“Oh, man, you got messed up,” I said through the tears that swam in my eyes, gingerly passing a hand over his bloodied, swollen cheek. I could barely speak for how out of breath I was, but I did my best. 

Dick really _did_ get messed up--his nose was clearly broken, still bleeding. His mask was cracked down the center, and livid bruising already flowered over his cheek and forehead. His lip was split and gushing blood as busily as his nostrils, but somehow, there he was, upright and in action.

“I did,” he agreed, his voice nasally and thick, grinning buoyantly, the expression absurd under all the blood, bruising, and swelling, “but they’ll need to do one better to take _me_ out.”

“Don’t tempt them,” I gasped out, the tears by then spilling indignantly down my cheeks. “I thought you were dead, man. Scared the _shit_ out of me, you actual dick.”

He smiled, and again, pulled me close. I held him so tightly my arms shook. 

“I’m okay, Kid,” he murmured into my dripping hair.

“You don’t _look_ okay,” I said, hugging him even tighter still, burrowing in, unable to get close enough. 

I hiccuped spectacularly, revisited suddenly by the time he caught me in a similar embrace after I returned from the Speed Force. After the tearful reunion with Artemis and my parents, Superman entered the room I was in at the Hall of Justice, said there was someone absolutely _bursting_ to see me--and with that, Dick came exploding in, all but going human bowling as he rushed to me, and wrapped me up suffocatingly in his arms. He didn’t even bother hiding his tears. I know I’ve mentioned it before, but I’ll mention it again. That’s not something I’ll ever forget. 

“I’m good, man, seriously--at least for another minute and thirty seconds, by Murphy’s guess, anyway,” Dick was saying. “She said that’s about how much time I have before my nose just starts gushing blood like Mauna Loa. I'm more worried about you--”

He abruptly thrust me away, twisting to meet none other than Mavra, her face half-burnt off, the flesh peeling back like blackened tissue paper, the ends still smoldering, the blood beneath like blanched onyx, who launched at him like a spear from above. 

Hashtag, hero life. Always the penultimate cock block.

I scrambled away from the rising action, still battling to replenish my breath, still fighting the effects of the spell from earlier. Stumbling, I bumped smack into Zatanna, who steadied me with her hands on my arms.

“Hold on, KF,” she said, studying me. Her face jumped in my fulgurating vision. “ _Evomer siht tnemtnahcne.”_

With an exhilarating rush, a powerful inflow of strength surged through my body, revitalizing my muscles. Feeling nothing shy of having been resurrected from death, I drew in a breath, anchored myself, and vibrated one hand. 

“Oh, thank God,” I said. “Z, you’re a saint. And if you’re not up for sainthood, you should at least be beatified.”

“Thank me later, KF,” she said, whirling to deflect a beam of energy shot at her with a couple of words I didn’t gather. 

I readied myself, taking stock of my surroundings. 

We were still in the strange, pitch-dark, foggy hinterland. I wasn’t sure how my companions had come to join me, or why only specific of them were here rather than all, but that seemed to matter somewhat less for the moment--I could ask about those details later. A ways off, Thomas, Tariq (freed at some point), Murphy, Nightwing, and Batman did battle with Mavra, who darted in and out of sight in her misty, rushing blur, her motions visible only to me with my affected sight. The UV flash grenades that Fox had crafted overnight lit up the strange, foggy landscape around us, eliciting furious screams from Mavra as she skittered to avoid them. The reek of garlic chased the trailing smoke that drifted in the wake of the detonating flash grenades. Teekl flitted about in the fray around Klarion, who was locked in combat with Harry and Zatanna. 

I watched in fascination as Harry, instantly _worlds_ removed from the dorky goofball I’d gotten to know over the last few days, stood his ground entirely unintimidated against the creature that _still_ gives me nightmares--and with a perfunctory shout of “ _Pyrofuego!”_ sent Klarion zooming upward through the air, screeching in an inhuman, terrifying howl, with a head-on strike under a blinding shaft of blue-white fire. I’d never really seen Klarion… _hurt_ before, but that did the trick--he whirled as though caught in a tornado, losing his grasp on levitation, crashing finally to the ground. 

(Maybe I laughed--a bit.) 

Teekl, in suped-up magic form, rushed protectively to him, hunching over his master’s tangled shape, baring his teeth. 

Some ways away, Mavra raised her hands, opening another strange rift in the air close to the bridge, and shouted in a language I couldn’t decipher. When her Scourge, Renfields, and Darkhounds filtered through the tear like a stampede of overgrown, bloodthirsty spiders, I sprang back into action. 

I heard Batman’s voice bellowing orders, and took note of the fact that Harry with alarming efficiency closed the rift with a shouted word, leaving us here on this strange plane with no opening (apparently) to Gotham. I mowed through a pile of vampires, grateful that these goons apparently weren’t as adroit or fast as Mavra, and raced toward Bruce.

“Kid Flash, you see that gem Klarion’s got--you need to try getting that from him and taking it to Harry or Zatanna so one of them can destroy it,” he said. “Make it quick. Before Mavra or any of her goons here can get their hands on you-- _you’re_ the one she’s after.”

“Roger that, Bats,” I said, and rushed toward Klarion, who had since gotten his creepy ass back up. I shifted, and wound up by Harry.

“Yo,” he said, smiling over at me. When Klarion sent a bolt of energy in our direction, Harry boosted his staff, and I watched in appreciation as the light spattered over it, dissipating in a spray of sparks. “You okay, Kid?”

“I’m good!” I replied. “What’s the plan?”

“Glad you asked,” said Harry, his smile broadening into a grin. “I’ve got a little deus ex machina coming in… T-minus one minute.” He deflected another of Klarion’s attacks, the deafening sound making me jump. “That being said, it’s a card I don’t care to play much, but Mavra didn’t just threaten _me_ this time around--this morning she sent me a little love note, indicating that she had every intention of making good on an old piece of blackmail that I told her _years_ ago if she ever brought up again, I’d gather every weapon I have available, every artifact, every ally, didn’t matter what or who it was, and I’d _hunt her down._ And this time, on top of that leverage? She added _more_ people I love and care for to her hit list--including one that frankly, KF, is my nuclear detonator button. Guess her up-and-coming new Kid Flash body made her get a little ballsy--literally.” He ground his teeth, a dangerous quality overtaking his sharp features. Abruptly, he bellowed, “ _Forzare!”_ and sent Klarion leaping to dodge. Teekl roared and advanced on us, Harry thrusting the form of the cat away by use of the same spell. When the beast spun to come toward us again, I shifted gears, nabbed Harry, and via my speed, zoomed us around to Klarion’s back. Zatanna appeared, taking over battle with Teekl. 

Harry blinked, clearly disoriented, keeping his balance with his grip on my shoulder.

“Hell's bells,” he said breathlessly, with a laugh. “It’s like someone just chucked me through a wormhole. Beam me up, Scottie!”

“Sorry, there wasn’t any time to warn you,” I said, grinning.

He shook his head. “That was _so cool--_ I can’t wait to tell Murph I traveled at Flash speeds! Anyway--” He gestured. “The bitch threatened my loved ones, slight additions to the planned offensive. And here we are.”

“Did you orchestrate all this?”

“Not quite.” He leveled a different spell on Klarion, who screeched in frustration. I shoulder-blocked a vampire that ran toward us in a screaming rage. “But I had a feeling Mavra might try to enter the Nevernever if she encountered more than she could handle in the mortal world. I had a contingency put in place if that were to happen, which is due to arrive in oh, about fifteen seconds. And on the normal plane, Nevernever or no, I’ve got a couple of literal white knights all too ready to break their swords off in the Black Court’s ass and a pack of werewolves just itching to settle the score laid out by all those dumb teen vampire books that should have arrived on that side of things two minutes ago.”

“Oh, sweet!” I said, heartened that my friends not in this… Nevernever place with us had help. “Why didn’t you say anything at the briefing?”

“Kid, Mavra’s had eyes on me from all angles for _years,”_ he said. “I had a feeling she had at least some clue as to what we were up to. Sorry to go all Batman on you guys and keep those plans to myself, but I had to be sure she thought she was aware of one plan so I could sideswipe her with another.” He looked up, and a dark, grimly amused smile crossed his face. “Speaking of… Cue my boss.”

Hearing that a wizard of Harry’s apparently exceptionally powerful caliber has a boss, one naturally expects to see Gandalf the White come roaring in on Shadowfax with his staff ablaze over his head, issuing volleys of magical, vampire-incinerating light from the beaming jewel at its intricately carved end, as the white-clad, awe-inspiring sorcerer bellows spells and decimates all of the enemies as he thunders over them like a bunch of insects. 

Uh-- _so_ not the case. 

My jaw hit the fucking ground when I saw a goddamn _supermodel_ come waltzing into sight out of the shadows, surrounded by _more_ supermodels (male and female alike), as though the Sylvan Elves came marching out of Lothlorien, ready to do battle with the forces of Mordor. They were all clad in gleaming, reflective, well-fitted armor, all were surrounded in a strange, eldritch glow. Power all but thrummed around these beings, and I couldn’t help feeling as though I witnessed a troop of angels that came straight out of Heaven.

“So… which one is your boss?” I asked stupidly, gawping like a lunatic. 

“That charming and clearly wicked wannabe Elsa at the front, there--the Queen of the Evil Faeries,” he said. “Or… Mab, the Queen of Air and Darkness. Get ready for it, Kid.”

I stared, watching with fascination, as the Scourge of vampires to an individual recoiled, shrieking, although whether from fear or anger, I couldn’t say. Every single eye in that place turned to that army of… well, faeries I guessed, namely to the inspiring figure at their fore.

I’ve seen some beautiful women in my day. Artemis definitely isn’t hurting. Diana, oh, definitely not--I mean, hello, Amazon Princess. Not to mention--I’ve seen plenty of other Amazons, and they’re all every bit as gorgeous as the next (not that it takes much to set me off, though, as mentioned.) _Not one of them_ had a damn thing on Mab. She was so… _otherworldly,_ removed, elevated--just _breathtaking,_ that I almost went to my knees. That aside, that beauty had a _power,_ an influence, an authority that I’d never dare challenge--so even if there was no Artemis or sudden gay lover in my life, no one was ever going to see me hitting on _her_ , even in jest. She was as tall as Wonder Woman, easily, with snowy hair that fell down her back and gleamed even in the darkness. Her skin was as smooth and reflective as marble, flawless and beautifully molded. Her eyes, green and cat-slitted, were flinty in the shadows. 

I bent down, covering my ears, overwrought and hollering in agony, when Mab’s voice issued from her full, blooming, mulberry lips--the sound, oh Christ on a crutch, _the sound._ I cried out, my hands clamped over my head, trying to keep my skull from separating beneath the borderline visible waves rocked over and through the landscape, rattling the ground and splintering the trees. 

“Mavra--you twisted, filthy, backbiting, _insignificant_ _snake--_ you _dare_ threaten my Champion, you _dare_ bring your pathetic, mewling _squabbles,_ your revolting _abominations,_ this ungodly creature of chaos into _my territory--”_

Mavra hissed and hunched her flaking shoulders, obviously cowed, but, and here I had to afford her a grudging respect, not backing down, either. 

Harry grimaced at me once the tirade was over. “Oh, she mad.”

“What now,” I moaned, my ears all but bleeding. At some point, I had wound up on my knees after all, just for reasons different than being totally awestruck. Even Klarion rolled on the ground, his hands over his head. (Ha, ha, fucker.)

In the pause, Zatanna, shaky on her feet, spoke a few words, and bound Klarion within an enchantment that I hadn’t yet seen from her--it was comprised of tethers that glowed blue, and constricted around his entire form, leaving not a limb free. Teekl listed back and forth, clearly torn. I couldn’t help feeling impressed--some years ago, Zatanna couldn’t hold out for more than a few minutes alone against Klarion, and now here she was, binding him with a comparative ease. Given the intense personal history with the Lord of Chaos, this had to be somewhat gratifying for her. 

Little babies, all of us grown up, I realized in a dizzy moment of revelation. Dick could probably handle himself against Bruce by then, I was at least Barry’s equal if not better, and Zatanna could confidently stand up to Klarion. I rubbed at my painful skull, watching as one of the Fae, this one with a headful of flaming red, curling tresses, wrested the gem from Klarion, and with one perfunctory word, shattered it. 

“All right, then, party's done, it’s time I take my departure,” Klarion said, unperturbed, and clucked. “Teekl…” 

This same redheaded Fae moved a hand, and a flash of light consumed Teekl’s form--and when the light faded, the familiar was little more than a statue of stone, unmoving, glittering like a carven, carbon crystal under the glow of the Sidhe that gathered among us. When Klarion screeched in protest, the Fae reinforced his bonds, and clapped a mystic gag over his mouth for good measure.

I blinked. Damn. That was… shockingly easy. 

A different voice spoke now, and I turned my gaze from Klarion and the unfortunate Teekl, seeing that this redheaded Fae was speaking to Mab's right. She was as tall as her Queen, and as ethereally beautiful (probably more Dick’s speed, I thought in a totally inopportune moment of humor, given her fiery red hair.)

“As there are mortals present,” this Fae began, “allow me to act as my Queen’s voice, so as to avoid visiting grievous bodily harm on the innocent parties that join us now.”

“Ah, my Faery Godmother is here,” said Harry wryly. “Always nice to know she serves a purpose beyond being a chronic pain in my ass.”

“ _That’s_ your-your Faery _Godmother?”_ I sputtered.

Harry quirked his lip in a half-smile. “The Leanansidhe, or just… Lea. She buddied around with my mother once upon a time, so I hear.”

“This just keeps getting weirder and weirder,” I said, shaking my head, amazed. 

“Mavra,” said Lea the Faery Godmother, “my Queen is _clearly_ quite angry. Not only have you threatened the life of the child of her Knight and the _protected family_ that cares for that child--the mortal family of the Winter Lady, no less--but you have dared bring a Lord of Chaos into the Nevernever in direct violation of the Unseelie Accords. And such an egregious action is in response to some petty grievance that you hold against her Knight, Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden. To that end, you have partaken in blood magic following an encounter that transpired years ago with Michael Carpenter, a presently retired Knight of the Cross, in order to enhance and reinhabit a body to your liking--the metahuman known as Kid Flash. The High Sidhe are not unfamiliar with the bad blood between you and the Winter Knight--but we care not for frivolous resentments or issues long since confronted and rendered moot. You have lost, Mavra. Take your leave graciously--and take this _monster_ with whom you have affiliated yourself with you. Show your face _not_ to the Winter Knight, and nor to any of his relations or affiliates, ever again--if you do, we will know, and we will respond, swiftly, and by pain of death. And the Sidhe are nothing if not true to their word. Take the beast Klarion and your Scourge and go.”

“Dresden is responsible for more misery than any creature present among us just now,” Mavra said in her arid voice, her bowed back straightening. “Allow me to take him to task for the evils he has imparted upon my kin and me. Surely you are not so--”

“Your loathsome kin are of no concern to us,” Lea said. “Attend to your business, and allow Dresden to attend to his. Do so, and you will be spared. This bargain is more than fair--in truth, it is far too kind for your abhorrent filth.”

I was astonished when Mavra rose, her rotten teeth bared in rage, her Scourge converging about her in a shadowy mass. Harry suddenly grabbed me, tugging me away from the scene. I fought, but he made it very clear whatever was about to happen, he didn’t want me near it. He shouted for Murph, and I watched, resisting Harry’s pulling, as she darted off to Batman. Bruce shouted, and our compatriots filed toward him, jogging away from the mounting tension.

“Kid, this isn’t for your people to see,” Harry said. “I know about your no-kill policies--and if Mavra’s challenging Mab, this is going to be a _bloodbath._ I _know_ none of you wants to answer for it or witness it or feel in some way responsible for it at the end of the day. And her people are going to be busy with Mab’s for right now--giving us the prime opportunity to just put a cap on this and wash our hands of it. So this is our cue to up and git--yesterday.”

He shouted a word, creating another of those strange openings, and I was again taken aback to see Gotham beyond that rift, where my teammates had effectively cleaned vampire and Renfield house under Westward Bridge. Wolfish shapes zipped across the whole scene, my known compatriots joined by two strangers, one wielding what appeared to be a freaking lightsaber. The group that had gone into the Nevernever with me filed hastily through the rift, hurrying at Murphy’s behest.

“What’s going to happen to Klarion?” I asked Harry, following my companions.

“Whatever Mab decides,” Harry said. “I can’t guarantee it’s going to be merciful, though. Not for you to worry about--that monster made his bed, he’s got to lie in it. Come on, let’s go.” 

I dared one glance over my shoulder before I jumped through the slit--and wished I hadn’t.

The last thing I saw before leaving that strange place was Mavra’s head, encased in ice, separated from her body, rolling toward the black water of the stream, as her vampires screamed into the darkness.

*******

“Bro, you look like busted-ass shit,” Jason said. 

Dick snorted, and cringed. 

He really did, though--his entire face by then was one variegated, colorful bruise, his left eye swollen shut beneath a deep, black-and-purple fold, his lower lip blown up to twice its normal size and caked in a coagulate of blood under the stitches that held it together. Prior to the debriefing, as the conflict resolved and everything wrapped up under Westward Bridge, Dick, with no prior warning, just all at once, and to everyone’s alarm, pitched right over onto his side, dead to the world unconscious. 

I didn’t exactly react calmly or in a collected manner. 

Rather than get into my embarrassing and unseemly response, I’ll just say that Bruce came hurrying over, not losing his composure for even a second, and shoved me out of his way with one cursory motion that landed me on my butt. Murphy and Babs came over, pulling me aside, getting me to the sidelines effectively enough, and, overcome and helpless and distressed, I just stood there crying like a wimp. Again. That weekend goes down in Wally history as the most lachrymose string of days I ever went through. Both women hugged me from either side, and all I can say to that end, is bless them for it.

The little guy with the lightsaber, Waldo, it turned out, was a coroner by trade, something that gave him some decent knowledge of first aid, and he and Bruce got Dick effectively revived quickly enough. (And then I kept crying, this time in my vast relief, seeing him unsteadily sit up.) So it happened, Murphy had earlier stemmed the blood flow from his nose after pulling him out of the river, but only temporarily--she had gotten it dammed up enough that he could reenter the fray per his loud insistence after Bruce initially told him to sit the whole thing out. Given that her ministrations had plugged up the blood long enough for Batman to give him the green light to stay in the action, Dick hadn’t been properly looked at or treated, and, to put not too fine a point on it, was a hot mess. The Renfield slamming him into the ground gave him some serious contusions and dislocated one rib, and then his face getting all up close and personal with the girder broke his nose, split his lip, mashed his eye, and cut the shit out of his forehead--not to mention the grade 3 concussion it gave him. According to Waldo, his mask actually saved his life--its bulk and cover was just enough that it absorbed the worst of the connection with the metal of the girder and guarded a decent portion of his face from it. Without it, he likely would have wound up with his nose slammed halfway into his brain, fragmenting the bone into a spray of shrapnel, effectively killing him or rendering him a vegetable. Dick waved the damaged mask, saying, “Buy this thing a drink,” before devolving into disoriented giggles. Zatanna worked some strange spell on the break in his nose, ensuring it would heal up straight, but given that healing magic wipes most sorcerers off the map, that was the extent of her nursing, and the _actual_ last time she played mom over that weekend. Now in the medlab of the Bat Cave, where I joined Nightwing, Red Hood, and Batman after everything wrapped up, Dick reclined on a cot, a dribbling cold pack pressed to his face. Barbara had declined coming back to the Cave, maintaining that she’d check in on Dick in the morning. We were all in civvies, a plate of sandwiches left by Alfred already demolished (I gave Jason one. Bruce took another. Dick turned down all food. I happily ate the remaining twenty or so.)

Disconcertingly, I was in the Cave because Bruce, before we left the field, told me in an ominously knowing tone, “You’re coming to the Cave with us. I need to talk to you.”

Okay.

I was somewhat all right with at least _part_ of that, though, because that way I could play helicopter sorta-boyfriend with Dick, ensuring he wasn’t going to lapse into a comatose state or die, and also just spend a little more time with him, before finally heading home to Artemis. I really, really missed her by then. And Brucely, too, I can’t lie, there. I love my dog, too, you know. However, at the same time, I didn’t feel a hundred percent ready to leave Dick, even if the odds were that I’d see him again in a day or two. 

But, on the flip, I really didn’t feel like talking to Bruce about this new relationship status, either--whatever was on the horizon for it. And I figured that was probably why he’d asked me back there.

I sat there in the medlab, next to Dick, across the cot from Jason. I don’t think it occurred to Jason to leave--I mean, it’s not like he was thinking about his potential for cock blocking, since he was in the presence of supposedly heterosexual dudes. But there he was, cock blocking without even realizing it, joshing with Dick. I swallowed my irritation, and wondered how he felt in the Bat Cave now, given the massive strain that existed between the rest of the Bat family and him. It was a little skeevy even for me, knowing that I stood across from a man who had essentially become a drug lord and had a handful of murders under his belt--even if the confirmed pieces of shit in question had deserved worse than what Jason had, in the end, dealt them. 

Still, the Red Hood’s presence in Gotham had produced a world of noticeable good, as well--crime was _way_ down, down enough that I had my suspicions Bruce occasionally found himself grateful for his League duties to fill the time left available by the sudden downturn in malfeasance in his city. Jason saw to more homeless shelters, more soup kitchens, more resources for battered women and abused or orphaned children, prostitutes and escorts got legit protection--hell, even _libraries_ got an enormous boost from his work. 

Few thanked him for it. I eyed Jason across the table, watching him interact with his big brother--now the one on the cot with the ice pack on his face. I really couldn’t tell if he was tense and uncomfortable, or if he was honestly happy to be back. Uncertain, nostalgic. Relieved, even? Or maybe… all of the above. 

I sighed, and had a startlingly vivid recollection of one day after school, when I was over at the manor, just kind of hanging out and playing video games, and Jason came home with a bloody nose. He wasn’t even Robin by then, or fully adopted by law--he was only a few weeks into his training, living under Bruce’s roof as his ward. Dick, still in high school and only just broadening at the shoulders, sent the controller flying and leapt to his feet, joining Alfred and Jay as they went downstairs to see to Jason’s busted up face. I remember sitting with them both after Alfred tended to Jay’s injuries, much like this, as Jason explained through the ice pack to Dick what happened. It was probably the earliest instance of Jay’s reticence where Bruce was concerned. 

Jason was bright--bright enough that even at eleven or twelve like he was then, he’d have held his own against plenty of my Stanford classmates in just about every subject. He was at Gotham Academy by then, a few years behind Dick, having tested comfortably into the school’s freshman curriculum, along with a handful of the AP courses. Some of the dillhole jocks in the senior class saw fit to pick on him, who immediately and fearlessly fought right back--and got his nose bloodied for it. Jay handled himself pretty well in a fight even then, mostly untrained and young as he was, given his history as a scrappy little street kid with some early size on him, but those _really_ big dudes got the better of him and gave him a solid pounding. 

The following day, Dick wound up with threats of suspension from GA when he tracked down the ringleader of those jocks and all but knocked his teeth in with one hit, promising worse if he or any of his pals so much as farted in Jason’s general direction. Dick and Jay were pretty inseparable following that incident, especially given that Dick respected Jason’s request that he not breathe a word of what had transpired, even when Bruce came down on his oldest like a ton of bricks about him having decked some jock in the locker room. Bruce only got the story asking around and acquiring the relevant word-of-mouth. 

Fun fact. I think if Dick were anyone else’s foster son, he’d have gotten his ass suspended--but the situation being what it was, I think he got a detention. Singular. Ha.

And now here we were, roles reversed, Dick propped up with the ice pack, and Jason goofing with him this time to cheer him up. Softening as I thought on it, watching them, I had a feeling that if there was one person on this earth that wouldn’t judge us for this new tack on our relationship, it was Jay. For all that guy’s flaws, a holier-than-thou, righteous, judgmental attitude was _not_ among them. And like I said, those two were thick as thieves, even in the face of strain and resentment from all angles. A permeating feeling of warmth for both of them stole through me, and my lip turned up a bit in a reflexive smile. 

Well, whatever happened--aside from Bart, my openly gay cousin, Jason was arguably among those I’d feel the most comfortable Coming Out to.

“Jason,” I broke in, cutting off whatever it was he was saying.

 _Here goes…_

“Yeah?”

“Can I ask you a ginormous favor?”

“Depends what it is,” Jason said. “Don’t ask me to cook for you right now, dude--I’m totally fried.” He shifted his neck to the side, dislodging a loud pop. “Stupid Scourge practically had us reenacting the damn Coliseum.”

“Can you bounce for like, five seconds?”

Jason gave me a look, and inclined his head.

“Sure,” he said, looking amused. “Why, you guys gonna make out or something?”

“Actually, yeah,” I said forcefully.

Jason burst out laughing, but the laughter faltered when I leveled a totally seriousface look at him. Dick turned his head toward me, and gave me a bit of a half-smile with his split, sutured lip. 

“Wally,” he said, with a weak, reedy chuckle. “I just had a concussion, dude.”

I grinned. “I’ll be gentle.”

“My lip’s split and bleeding.”

“I won’t kiss you there.”

“I look like busted-ass shit. You heard Jay.”

I snorted. “You look injured. You couldn’t look like busted-ass shit if you tried.”

“Holy shit, Wally, you’re serious, aren’t you?” Jason interjected.

“Dead serious,” I said. “Now fuck off.”

“What--just--I mean--aren’t you guys--” He gestured. 

Dick shook his head, and flinched. 

“We _thought_ we were,” he said. “Then we kinda touched some magic snake and uh, that opened up to playing with you know, _other_ snakes and--” He abruptly cracked up in a fit of drunken giggles, and then lifted a hand to his head. “Ow. _Fuck._ Why can’t I have painkillers again?”

“You just took some,” Jason reminded him. “They just haven’t set in yet.” He laughed. “You’re a mess, bro.”

“I’m a hot mess, though,” Dick maintained, and then giggled again.

Jason looked at me. “What about your girls, man?”

I sighed. “Well, they know about the whole thing, at least. What’s going to happen from here remains to be seen. I’m… not real sure how this is going to turn out, to be honest.”

“How did…” Jason gestured. “Like, how did this _happen?”_

I explained, starting with Harry the Clown, Joker’s Funhouse/Phantom Theater, severely censored accounts of our blazing hot intimacies, Zatanna’s revelation regarding the rubber snake, our sleuthing and detective work (which reminded me that we still needed to return the tapes to Amusement Mile), the meeting with Harry and the overwhelming stream of answers that poured in, and finishing with the awkward conversations with the girls before Fight Night. 

Jason shook Dick’s shoulder. “Stay awake, dude. You can’t sleep for another day or so, you know.”

“Fuck you,” Dick muttered thickly.

Jay gave him a broad smile, and then looked back up at me. 

“Damn, man,” he said. “That’s some… Well, that’s some serious shit. And I gotta tell you, Wally, I’m pretty sure you’re totally screwed--I’m guessing Bruce picked up on all that, and that’s why _you’re_ here all of a sudden.”

I nodded, sighed, and ground my fingers into my forehead. “Probably.” 

“I’m really not that shocked, though, Wally,” Jason said, his tones thoughtful. “About this.”

“That’s what everyone keeps saying…” I sighed.

Jason smiled.

“See? Everything’s kismet. Meant to be. In that case, I’ll just kind of… take my leave, and give you a minute,” he said, and cracked up a little as he turned to leave the room. “Peace… and don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, not that that narrows it down or anything.”

As Jason made his way out of the room with a wave, I smiled down at Dick, who looked about four seconds from dropping off. I ran a hand over his hair, careful around his injuries, and pressed my lips to his forehead. 

“I promise no more than that,” I said. 

“You owe me, then,” he murmured, as he smiled back at me.

“Rain check,” I agreed. 

Bruce walked in, his mask removed. Alfred followed, and approached the cot. 

“Wally, come out here a minute,” Bruce said. “Dick, Alfred’s going to stay here with you while I talk to Wally. Won’t be long.”

Subtly, I squeezed Dick’s fingers, and filed out of the room after Bruce. 

“What’s up, doc?” I asked, sitting down across from him by the Bat Cave computers, accepting the coffee he handed me. 

“Let me ask you. What is the nature of your relationship with my son?” he asked. Ah, Bruce. Always one to cut straight to the chase. “You’ve been close for a long time, that’s no secret.” He sat back, studying me, his face impassive, obnoxiously unreadable. “But I’m getting the impression that there’s more to that story as of last night.”

“Try Thursday,” I said, sighing, setting my coffee down. I rubbed at my face. “Might as well level--we kind of encountered some sorcery that apparently woke up some latent feelings we’ve had for each other.”

Bruce grunted. “What kind of feelings?”

“Bruce, don’t make me spell it out,” I said. “But… fine, newly realized bisexuality.”

“Hmm. This sorcery didn’t create or plant those inclinations?”

I shook my head. “No. Dick and I spent the whole weekend figuring this out, Bruce. Apparently, it was a spell intended to invoke lust, and all it ended up doing was backfiring.”

“How so?”

“Just by opening the door to feelings that were already there,” I explained. “So… it tried invoking lust… and…”

“Got love instead?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

Bruce was silent for a moment, gazing at me, completely expressionless. 

“It takes people years, at times, to make heads or tails of their sexuality,” he said finally, after a long, impossibly uncomfortable silence. “And oftentimes it’s a fluid thing--like it shifts and changes over the years. I don’t pretend to be an expert, but these are just things that I’ve observed. While it’s the farthest thing from a shock to hear that Dick is bisexual--like many fathers before me, I’ve suspected as much since long before he even did--I _am_ a little surprised to learn that _you_ are.”

I snorted. “Well, join the club.”

Again, he grunted. “So you’ll forgive me a little skepticism, here. Either way, this couldn’t have come at a worse time.” He paused. “Am I correct in that?”

“Why do you say that?”

“Well, aren’t you ring shopping?”

I paused. The truth was, eh, kind of sort of. I had been ring… window shopping. Dick, in fact, had come with me on one occasion to get a handle on whether the jeweler was a total slimeball, and had gone through a handful of Internet links I sent him so I could bounce some non-committal ideas off of him and Barbara. I wanted to pop the question on Artemis--I just hadn’t decided what a good time would be. I mean, I hadn’t even finished grad school yet, and Artemis had only been at her first Big Girl Job for a few months. I frowned at Bruce. 

“How’d you know that?” I asked. 

“Dick mentioned it, asking if I knew any reasonable, non-sleazy jewelers in Palo Alto,” Bruce said. “So as you were considering asking your girlfriend to marry you, my son was equally considering asking Barbara to shack up with him in Bludhaven.”

“He was?”

“I’m not sure of how serious he was,” Bruce said. “I didn’t press him on it. He just offhandedly mentioned one day that life might be more convenient if they moved in together. Whether or not he was thinking about it in depth, I can’t say--but the fact is, the subject came up.”

I was silent. 

“Do some serious, serious thinking before you make any real decisions, Wally,” said Bruce, staring hard at me. “I mean it. There’s too much at stake, here. A few days of schmaltzy bliss is not _nearly_ enough time to hinge an entire elective upheaval on. I know everything seems like it’ll be fine at first when you think you’re in love and you’re on the honeymoon high and all that, but don’t forget that you have _four_ hearts that stand to truly be broken in all of this--and one of which _really_ shouldn’t have to stand seeing itself broken any more than it already has been.”

I folded my hands, my elbows resting on my knees. I lifted my head, and met Bruce’s gaze. 

“Trust me, we’ve been through this,” I said. “Both of us. We know.”

“I repeat. A few days is _not_ enough time to have really ‘been through this,’” Bruce said. “Listen, Wally. This isn’t even to mention what your girlfriend has experienced. But Dick’s been through a lot--and not just since last week, or even over the last few days. That boy at twenty-four has seen more trauma and suffered more heartache in his life than a person _ever_ should, even over a thousand lifetimes.”

“I know, Bruce.”

He lifted his brows, his lips thinning. “Do you?”

Abruptly, I’d heard enough. I leapt to my feet.

“You act like I haven’t been there right by his goddamn side throughout the vast majority of the epic reams of shit he’s been through,” I snapped, furiously gesticulating. “You act like I’ve just been hanging out on the sidelines, cluelessly watching him suffer, totally oblivious to what he’s gone through, just that stupid jester cracking jokes at everyone’s expense. _Like everyone fucking else._ Well, I’m sorry for this in advance, and I’m only going to say it once--but _fuck you,_ Bruce Wayne. You’ve _completely failed_ to truly provide what Dick has needed throughout all these years--from his _own mouth_ he called you the fucking Arctic--and here you are, getting all up on your high horse with me, when you clearly have _no idea_ just what he means to me, or what _I_ mean to him, or just _how much_ I would do for him. How _far_ I’d go for his sake. All I’d give, all I’d give up. How fucking _hard_ I’d work to make him happy--like he absolutely deserves. Yeah, this situation sucks, yeah, it blows especially hard for Artemis and Barbara, but guess what, you sanctimonious asshole--we’ve already talked to both of them, and they’ve been _nothing but understanding._ I have no idea where we’re going from here, I really don’t, but if you’re really so concerned, I will tell you one thing right now--I ever do a fucking thing to hurt Dick, even if it’s _trivial_ or _stupid,_ you have my _full_ permission to skin me alive and cut my balls off and string me up by my cock for the crows to pick. I’d see all that and myself _dead_ first. Understand? Do you need me to spell it out for you a little more clearly? Want me to just hand you the scalpel and wire?”

I paused, and fell into my seat with a thump, heaving an aggravated outburst of breath. Bruce, for his part, was silent, leaning back in his seat, apparently unruffled by my tirade--although I saw a line appearing between his brows. I looked away, focusing angrily on one of the keyboard ports.

Finally, Bruce stood, and approached me. 

“Wally,” he said. 

I looked up at him, my jaw clenched, my entire body tensed, every muscle on the fight. 

I about lost hold of that jaw when Bruce reached down, grasped my shoulder, and said, “ _This._ This is what my son deserves.”

And then, in a swirl of cape, he walked off, heading back toward the medlab. I leapt up, and zoomed to come up beside him.

“Wait,” I said. “What?”

“Whatever you decide between the both of you, I’ll be in your corner,” he told me, halting, and facing me. “Listen, West. I’m not unaware of my failings. But… Regardless. Like every father, I want what’s best for my son, and I can’t always articulate it like I should, but I _do_ care about him--far more than he realizes. And maybe… Well, I’ll just say this. Years later, and he still surprises me.” He paused, and then, to my increasing surprise, gave me one of his rare smiles. “I trust you both. I trust you to handle it properly. I trust that you have Dick’s best interest at heart. And Artemis’, and Barbara’s. And I’ll stand by you in this, should the time come.” 

I stood stupidly, stricken totally dumb for a moment, as Bruce made his way into the medlab. My head whirled in astonished circles. 

Well.

 _That_ I didn’t quite expect.

Blinking, I headed in a daze into the medlab. I came in on Bruce standing with Dick, talking in a low voice I didn’t discern. He looked up at me, and gave me something of a slight nod, just before he reached down, and in an exceptionally uncommon display of affection, squeezed Dick’s shoulder.

“Rest up,” he said. "But don't sleep." 

“No promises,” Dick murmured, half-smiling.

“You’d best promise, Master Richard,” said Alfred. “We’ll leave you to it, but only if we have your word you won’t succumb to sleep.”

“I’ll keep him awake,” I said. 

“I’m sure you will,” Bruce said in yet another rare moment of humor. 

Was Hell freezing over? I quirked my lip, and nodded to Bruce and Alfred as they filtered quietly out of the room, and then sat down in the seat next to Dick’s cot. 

“Well, how are you doing?” I asked, adopting cheer in the wake of all that sensory overload, switching on the little mini flat screen in the corner to watch TV. 

“Honestly, kind of shocked that Bruce just… squeezed my shoulder, and then cracked a freaking joke right after,” he said, closing his eyes. “Other than that… Sleepy.”

“Don’t make me jerk you off,” I said. “If that’s what it takes to keep you awake.”

“Dude, if I blow my load everywhere, not only will Alfred kill me for making a totally disgusting mess, but I’ll definitely go straight to sleep mode from there. Boop-beep-boop.”

I laughed. “All right, I won’t use that method to keep you up.”

He turned to me, looking at me with his one open, exceptionally blue eye. 

“You don’t have to hang here, you know,” he said quietly. “If you want to go home, actually talk to Artemis, you can. I’m not going to make you stay.”

I laid a hand on his hair. “Do you _want_ me to go?”

He smiled, slowly, and shook his head. “No.”

I smiled in return. “Then I’m staying.”

“I just don’t want you having to face more music than you already have to.”

I leaned over, and kissed his forehead, his cheek, the uninjured corner of his lips.

“Music’s not going anywhere,” I told him, laying my arm on the cot next to him, resting my chin on the crook of my elbow. “And… We’ll face it together. Believe it or not, Bruce is in our corner. Whatever we decide, or so he told me.”

He stared at me, one brow lifting.

“Yep,” I said. “I know you’re not shocked he figured it out, the fucking wizard. So… Tell you what. How about I hang here with you until you can sleep, and then I’ll get out of your hair. And face the first movement in this insane symphony.”

He shifted, moving a little closer to me, and nodded. “You sure?”

“Yeah,” I murmured to him, running my fingers through his hair. “Like I’ve been saying all weekend, Dick. We’ll figure this out.”

He smiled. “I’ll accept that.”

I dropped a light, careful kiss on his lips. 

“It’ll be all right,” I told him. “We’ll be okay.”

His smiled widened a bit, and he lay back, reclining into the pillows under him, and I helped him prop the ice pack on his face in tolerable comfort. I can’t say I was real sure at that point about the hereafters of this entire thing, but I _did_ believe my own words, whatever happened--

It would be all right.

We’d be okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bonus chapter is in the works. <3 Taking a wee break for now, but will start work on it next week. <3 Stay tuned... :D :D


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